HOOPOES. 
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streaks of brown. The wings and tail are black, the 
former with five regular white bars on each, 
and the latter with a chevron of wdiite, the angle 
directed to the body of the bird. Its flight through 
the air is by leaps, or undulatory, and, to appearance, 
performed with considerable labour ; but from the 
long migrations which it makes, it must be capable of 
long continuance.* The engraving represents the 
bill of Epimachus magnijicus, the Splendid Epima- 
chus, which has the bill of JJpupa and Promeropnj 
with the scaly or velvet feathers covering the nostrils. 
as in the Birds of Paradise. The plumage is ex- 
tremely brilliant, and the flank feathers of the male 
are elongated an d fringed. Sonnerat says that there does 
not perhaps exist a more extraordinary bird than the 
Grand Promerops of IS'ew Guinea. It is four feet in 
length, from the extremity of the bill to tliat of tlie 
tail. Its body is delicate, slender, and, although it is 
of an elongated form, appears short and excessively 
small in comparison Avith the tail. To add to the 
singularity of this bird, Nature has placed above and 
below its wings feathers of an extraordinary form,, 
and such as one does not see in other birds ; she 
seems, moreover, to have pleased herself in painting 
this being, already so singular, with her most brilliant 
♦ Feathered Tribes of the British Islands. 
