Birds of Celebes: Psittacidae. , 
139 
First plumage. The young ones are quite green (Meyer 7). 
Measurements. "VVing 183 — 195 nun (14 specimens); tail 95 — 104 (without the rackets); tarsus 
19; culmcn from cere 22| — 25. 
Distribution. North Celebes, the Togian Islands and (?) the Sangi Islands. — Minahassa 
(Forsten 2, hi, Wallace a 1, Meyer 7, etc., Platen 72); Banka Id. (Nat. Coll, 
in Dresd. Mus.); Lemheh Id. (Nat. Coll.); Gorontalo District — Limhotto (Meyer 7); 
Gorontalo (Riedel in Dresd. Mus.); Togian Islands (Meyer 7); (?) Sangi Islands 
(Brliggem. 5). 
Observation. Briiggemann (5) received a single specimen, marked “Sangir cf”, amongst 
31 specimens from Dr. Fischer and Dr. Riedel. It presented some slight differences 
of coloration, though, as the author remarked, these might have been due to im- 
, maturity. Further evidence should be obtained before the Sangi Islands be admitted 
as a habitat of P. fiamcans or of a local form of it. It would be a matter of no 
surprise if these islands or at least some of them should be found to harbour races 
of both P. flavicans and platurus. 
That P. flavicans on the jnainland has only been found in the northern Penin- 
sula up to the present is remarkable. 
This Racket-tailed Parrot is, to our mind, by no means so highly differen- 
tiated a species as P. platurus, and the nearest affinities of it and its near 
allies, P. verticalis Sharpe (Bull. B. O. C. 1893, X, Nov. 28) of the Sooloo Is- 
lands (similarly marked, but differing in the shades of red and blue on head and 
greenish on under surface) and P. montanus Grant of Luzon are not difficult 
to find. The female and immature male of P. flavicans differ from the adult 
P. discurus (Vie ill.) — both male and female — of the Philippines in little, 
except that the Celebesian form is a good deal larger, the blue of the crown 
less pale, and the underside of the quills and tail paler and greener. The 
adult male of Prioniturus flavicans has the addition of a poppy-red patch on 
the crown of the head; it is therefore most likely that P. flavicans is derived 
from a form similar to P. discurus — or, rather, its ancestor — the adult male 
of which in Celebes has become larger and obtained the addition of a red patch 
on the head. This view appears to us more plausible than the converse hy- 
pothesis, that P. discurus is descended from P. flavicans, and that the adult 
male of it does not attain to its full development in the Philipj^ines. 
The genus Prioniturus has a very restricted range over the Philippines and 
the Celebes group exclusive as far as is known of Sula, though it may occur 
on Burn and in this case no doubt also on Sula. 
The known forms from the Philippines, except perhaps P. verticalis and 
montanus, have a simpler, less specialized apjiearance than the two Celebesian 
ones. Over the greater part of the former occurs P. discurus (V.) and on 
Luzon P. luconensis Steere and montanus also, whereas Mindoro, Palawan and 
Sooloo have forms and species of their own: P. mindorensis Steere, P. cyani- 
ceps Sharpe, P. suluensis W. Bias, and P. verticalis Sharpe, the two last 
on different islands of the Sooloo group. A better knowledge will perhaps 
prove that there are further difi’erences amongst the specimens from the different 
islands of the Philippine group. 
IS* 
