NESOCENTOR MILO. 
Solomon-Islands Lark-heeled Cuckoo. 
Centropus milo, Gould, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1856, p. 136. — Gray, Cat. B. Tropical Isl. Pacific Ocean, p. 34 (1859). 
— Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1869, p. 124. — Gray, Hand-1. B. ii. p. 213, no. 8974 (1870). — Ramsay, Proc. 
Linn. Soc. N. S. Wales, iv. p. 69 (1879). 
Nesocentor milo, Cab. & Heine, Mus. Hein. iv. p. 120 (1862). — Salvad. Ann. Mus. Civic. Genov, xiii. p. 463 
(1878). — Id. Orn. Papuasia e delle Molucche, i. p. 385 (1880). — Grant, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1888, p. 191. 
The genus Nesocentor was founded in 1862 by Drs. Calmnis and Heine for the reception of several Lark- 
heeled Cuckoos Iron) the Austro-Malayan Subregion ; but apart from their sombre style of coloration, we 
can see no reason for separating these birds from the. genus Centropus, though in the present instance we 
have adopted the nomenclature of Count Salvadori, the leading authority on Papuan ornithology. 
The type specimen of the present species was discovered by the late John Macgillivray on the island of 
Guadalcanal', where it has since been met with by Mr. Woodford and other travellers. The typical example 
is not quite adult, and was described hv Count Salvadori in his work on the birds of New Guinea. He 
appears afterwards to have entertained some doubt as to the specimen described By him in England having 
been really the type ; and on requesting Hr. Sclater to re-examine the specimen, he was assured by the 
latter gentleman that it did not exist in the Museum. How this mistake arose we cannot say, and we 
have no immediate recollection of a visit from Dr. Sclater to examine the specimen in question ; it may 
have been temporarily mislaid during the removal of the Natural History collections down to South 
Kensington, but we are happy to say that it is quite safe in the national collection. 
As pr as is known, the present species is only found in the island of Guadalcanal-, in the Solomon group, 
where it replaces the smaller N. ateralbus of New Ireland, which is a violet-black bird with a white head. 
The latter is also said to inhabit the Solomon Islands on the faith of a collection sent bv Mr. Krefft to 
Dr. Sclater in 1871. So many birds in this collection really came from New Ireland, and not from the 
Solomons, that we may fairly suppose that the locality for N. ateralbus is wrongly recorded. 
In N. milo the adult male is black, sides of the body greenish black with a steel-green gloss; the head, 
neck, mantle, throat, and breast creamy white ; the abdomen black. Total length 28 inches, culmen 2-3, 
wing 10' 1, tail 13’o, tarsus 2'65. I lie young is rufous streaked with black, and somewhat resembles the 
adults of other Lark-heels. 
The figures in the Plate are taken from an adult male and a young female shot on Guadalcanar by Lieut. 
Reginald Tapper, R.N., and presented by him to the British Museum. He says that the iris was yellow or 
orange. Mr. Woodford gives the iris as red, and the bill and feet black, in an adult male from Aola. 
Another adult male had a brown iris and grey feet, while in an adult female and an immature bird the iris 
was dark grey and brown respectively. 
[R. B. S.] 
