496 
Mr. G. L. Bates on the 
dark brownish-black, the middle pair with three and the 
outer pairs with five large, rounded, white spots on the inner 
web only. Throat, middle of the chest, and under tail- 
coverts white ; sides of the chest and flanks brown mixed 
with whitish-buff; middle of the chest, breast, and belly 
whitish-buff, each feather with a large, terminal, round or 
oval spot of dark brown ; under wing-coverts pale buff. Iris 
bright yellow; bill dull yellow; feet yellow, claws yellow 
with black tips. Culmen ca. 12 mm. ; wing 105 ; tail 70; 
tarsus about 20. 
This type-specimen is the only one that I have seen. It was 
shot by Nkolo, who discovered it through the noise made by 
other small birds mobbing it as it sat hidden in a thicket. 
Agapornis pullaria. [Ko-nkae.] 
Sharpe, Ibis, 1904, p. 605; 1907, p. 428; Bates, Ibis, 
1905, p. 89. 
One of the prettiest sights I ever recollect was five or six 
Ko-nkae flying up from a little stream where they had been 
bathing, the blue of the rump-feathers shewing very con¬ 
spicuously. 
No. 4318, $ , was shot by my boy as it came out of a hole 
in an ants'’ nest (njak) high up in an aseng tree, near the 
village. I went to see the place, and the boy climbed up and 
begun to chop the njak , which was hard and earthy and 
firmly attached to the large tree-stem—a different kind of 
njak from the one in which a Woodpecker's nest was found 
(cf. ‘ Ibis/ 1909, p. 20). The big ants inhabiting the njak 
bit him so cruelly that he had to come down. The tree was 
then chopped down ; but the hole in the njak was found 
empty. I suppose the hole had been excavated by these 
birds ; the mate of the one killed was seen in the tree-tops 
near by. How do they endure the ants ? They must work 
so gently that the ants are not disturber!. These fierce ants 
would be an excellent defence for the birds against robbers 
of their nest. 
The ova and oviduct were not yet enlarged in this example. 
These most loving birds must keep house together long before 
they rear their brood. 
