Letters, Announcements, &c. 505 
the synonymy of my ‘ Birds of South Africa’ are entirely at- 
tributable to this cause; and though I shall be glad if Mr. 
Sharpe, with the unrivalled opportunities at his command, 
can purge my pages of their errors, I agree with you in re- 
gretting (Ibis, 1875, p. 505) that he has altogether suppressed 
the synonymy and descriptions of genera &c. in the second 
edition now being issued. 
Since Mr. Whitmee wrote his paper I have had the good 
fortune to make his personal acquaintance; and together we 
have carefully gone over the birds of Samoa, most of which 
I procured whilst staying under his hospitable roof. Of 
course the ‘ Ornithologie Centralpolynesiens’ of Drs. Finsch 
and Hartlaub was our textbook, and only reference; and 
the question then arises, Are the descriptions of species con- 
tained in it (those of Peale, Cassin, and others) original de- 
scriptions, or only those of the learned doctors themselves 
from specimens acquired by them ? 
The first bird that engaged our attention was the common 
Pachycephala, which Mr. Whitmee had previously sent me 
amongst other specimens. Whatwasit? My friend said he 
had identified it with P. icteroides ; but no mention is made, 
in the description, of the dark ashy grey of the chin and sides 
of the throat, which the Samoan bird possesses. I was in- 
clined to call it P. flavifrons, as a Fijian bird, found on Ovalau, 
answered sufficiently to the description of P. icteroides ; but 
I was met by the “ gutture albo” of P. flavifrons, while all 
notice of the yellow patch near the nostrils was omitted !! 
The Fijian bird (P. icteroides ?) is not found in Samoa; nor 
is the Samoan bird (P. flavifrons?) found in Fiji. Some of 
the Fijian species have a yellow nostril-patch; others have 
not (care must be taken not to confound it with P. graffi, 
wherein the patch is very distinct). If I am right in my 
conjecture, the Samoan bird will stand as P. flavifrons 
(Peale), and the description in the ‘Ornithologie’ must be 
amended by the substitution of “doris nitide flavis” for “ gut- 
ture albo.” 
But what is Pachycephala albifrons (Peale)? None of us 
here can identify it. I fancy it must be either an abnormal 

