THE BIRDS OF LIBERIA 679 
Red-headed Love-bird, as common, nesting in holes scooped out of the termites’ 
nests in trees. 
CORACIIFORMES 
CORACIIDAE Rollers 
Eurystomus afer afer (Latham). West African Broad-billed Roller; ‘““Day Bat” 
Coracias afra Latham, Index Orn., vol. 1, p. 172, 1790: Africa. 
Size of a waxwing, length 9 inches; cinnamon above and below, washed with purple underneath 
and on the wing-coverts; under tail-coverts, under side of wings, and tail-feathers except their 
black tips, sea green; bill orange yellow. Female similar but abdomen green. Senegal to Congo. 
This seems to be the commoner of the two species of this genus in Liberia, 
but curiously, we did not meet with it. Buiittikofer and Stampfli found it near 
Fisherman Lake, Cape Mount, and on the Junk, Du, and Mesurado rivers 
all the way along the coast to Cape Palmas; while at Nifu and Nana Kru 
on the southern coast, Lowe regarded it as the commonest bird seen during 
his brief stay in January. Possibly it is more abundant on the coast or at 
certain seasons of the year, for it seemed to be lacking in the interior where 
we were. Thus Bittikofer at Hill Town saw hundreds nearly every evening 
wheeling in the air for insects but noted that in the daytime they would spend 
hours sitting on a dry twig exposed to the sun. At Mount Coffee, again, a short 
distance inland, Oberholser records that the single specimen sent him by Currie 
was the only one seen by that collector. 
Eurystomus gularis gularis Vieillot. Blue-throated Roller 
Eurystomus gularis Vieillot, Nouv. Dict. des Sci. Nat., vol. 29, p. 246, 1819: “Australasia.” 
Size of the preceding; rich dark cinnamon above and below, except the wings and tail which 
are black with blue central areas; longer upper and lower tail-coverts black; throat blue; bill 
broad, yellow. Senegal to Gold Coast. 
The blue throat distinguishes this species at once. It is apparently much 
rarer than the preceding for in all his experience in the country Biittikofer 
met with it apparently but few times, and records only three specimens taken, 
namely, on the St. Paul’s River at Bavia and Soforé Place. Oberholser (1899) 
records a single specimen taken at Mount Coffee by Currie, on the same river, 
and Chubb (1905, p. 207), a female from the St. Paul’s River, December 16. 
The only bird we obtained was the male of a pair seen at Lenga Town on the 
Farmington River, August 21. They were perched after the manner of fly- 
catchers on the dead twigs of a tall tree standing in a clearing, whence they 
would fly out to snap up passing insects and return to the twig. Their second- 
aries are so much shorter than the primaries that in flight the spread wing has 
a characteristic narrowed appearance at its base. At one or two other places 
we saw single individuals of this bird but it seemed altogether infrequent and 
Kemp (1905) regards it as rare in the interior of Sierra Leone. It would be 
interesting to establish what difference there may be between the habits and 
haunts of the two species. Possibly this is more stationary, and does not mi- 
grate over the rains. 
