PTEROGLOSSUS HUMBOLDTI, Wa S i. 
Humboldt’s Ara^ari. 
Specific Character. 
Mas.— Pter. rostro majore; mandibula superiore flavescenti-aurantiaca, culmine, lined bascili 
cingente, maculdque ad singulam serraturam nigris; mandibula inferiore nigra, ad basin 
Jlavescenti-aurantkico cincta. 
Male. —Head, neck, throat and chest black ; back, wings and tail olive-green ; upper tail- 
coverts crimson; primaries blackish brown; under surface yellow, tinged with green on 
the flanks ; thighs chestnut; upper mandible yellowish orange, the culrnen, tip, a line down 
the sides near the base, and a narrow irregular mark above each serrature black; under 
mandible black, bounded at the base with orange-yellow ; orbits, in front of the eye 
greenish blue, above and behind purer blue, beneath lilac, between which and the purer 
blue is a triangular mark of scarlet; irides dark carmine; legs and feet dark green. 
Total length, 16 inches ; bill, 4 ; wing , 54; tail, 64; tarsi, If. 
Female. —Sides of the face, ear-coverts, throat and chest chestnut; in all other respects similar 
to the male. 
Pteroglossus Humboldtii, Wagl. Syst. Av., Pteroglossus, sp. 4.—Gould, in Proc. of Zool. Soc., 
Part III. p. 157-—Gould, Mon. of Ramph., pi. 22.—lb. Sturm’s Edit., pi. .—Gray and 
Mitch. Gen. of Birds, vol. ii. p. 404, Pteroglossits, sp. 11.—Bonap. Consp. Gen. Av., p. 94, 
Pteroglossus, sp. 12. 
This species, although known to us for nearly thirty years, having- been first discovered in the western parts 
of Brazil, by Spix and Martins, previous to 1824, is still very rare in collections. Its native country is the 
extensive and almost unexplored forests of the Upper Amazon and the Rio Madeira ; it was in the latter 
country that M. Natterer obtained his specimens, and it is to him that I am indebted for the colouring- of 
the soft parts, he having kindly communicated them to me during his sojourn in London, when on his 
return from the Brazils to Vienna; and they may therefore be depended on. 
Mr. Wallace, who procured specimens on the southern bank of the Amazon above the Rio Madeira, 
informs me that, like the Curl-crested Arapari (Pteroglossus Beauharnaisi), it is very local, and that, as is also 
the case with some other members of this family, a river often forms the boundary of its habitat; a feature 
which I frequently observed to occur with respect to Australian birds, both in Van Diemen’s Land and on 
the continent of Australia. 
This fine species is very nearly allied to P. hiscriptus, and exhibits a similar style of markings on the 
sides of the bill; but the much larger size of the bird and the entire black colouring of the under mandible 
readily distinguish it from that species. 
The Plate represents the two sexes of the natural size. 
