THE STANDARD WING.

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ian, and all the specimens from the former island have the green breast-shield rather longer, the crown of the head darker violet, and the lower parts of the body rather more strongly scaled with green. This is the only paradise bird yet found in the Moluccan district, all the others being confined to the Papuan Islands and North Australia.

We now come to the Epimachidæ, or Long-billed Birds of Paradise, which, as before stated, ought not to be separated from the Paradiseidæ by the intervention of any other birds. One of the most remarkable of these is the Twelve-wired Paradise Bird, Paradisea alba of Blumenbach, but now placed in the genus Seleucides of Lesson.

This bird is about twelve inches long, of which the compressed and curved beak occupies two inches. The color of the breast and upper surface appears at first sight nearly black, but a close examination shows that no part of it is devoid of color; and by holding it in various lights, the most rich and glowing tints become visible. The head, covered with short velvety feathers, which advance on the chin much farther than on the upper part of the beak, is of a purplish bronze color; the whole of the back and shoulders is rich bronzy green, while the closed wings and tail are of the most brilliant violet purple, all the plumage having a delicate silky gloss. The mass of feathers which cover the breast is really almost black, with faint glosses of green and purple, but their outer edges are margined with glittering bands of emerald green. The whole lower part of the body is rich buffy yellow, including the tuft of plumes which spring from the sides, and extend an inch and a half beyond the tail. When skins are exposed to the light the yellow fades into dull white, from which circumstance it derived its specific name. About six of the innermost of these plumes on each side have the midrib elongated into slener black wires, which bend at right angles, and curve somewhat backward to a length of about ten inches, forming one of those extraordiary and fantastic ornaments with which this group of birds abounds. The bill is jet black, and the feet bright yellow. (See lower figure on the plate at the beginning of this chapter.)

The female, although not quite so plain a bird as in some other species, presents none of the gay colors or ornamental

plumage of the male. The top of the head and back of the neck are black, the rest of the upper parts rich reddish brown; while the under surface is entirely yellowish ashy, somewhat blackish on the breast, and crossed throughout with narrow blackish wavy bands.

The Seleucides alba is found in the island of Salwatty, and in the north-western parts of New Guinea, where it frequents flowering trees, especially sago-palms and pandani, sucking the flowers, round and beneath which its unusually large and powerful feet enable it to cling. Its motions are very rapid. It seldom rests more than a few moments on one tree, after which it flies straight off, and with great swiftness, to another. It has a loud shrill cry, to be heard a long way, consisting of "Cáh, cáh," repeated five or six times in a descending scale, and at the last note it generally flies away. The males are quite solitary in their habits, although, perhaps, they assemble at certain times like the true paradise birds. All the specimens shot and opened by my assistant Mr. Allen, who obtained this fine bird during his last voyage to New Guinea, had nothing in their stomachs but a brown sweet liquid, probably the nectar of the flowers on which they had been feeding. They certainly, however, eat both fruit and insects, for a specimen which I saw alive on board a Dutch steamer ate cockroaches and papaya fruit voraciously. This bird had the curious habit of resting at noon with the bill pointing vertically upward. It died on the passage to Batavia, and I secured the body and formed a skeleton, which shows indisputably that it is really a bird of paradise. The tongue is very long and extensible, but flat and a little fibrous at the end, exactly like the true Paradiseas.

In the island of Salwatty, the natives search in the forests till they find the sleeping place of this bird, which they know by seeing its dung upon the ground. It is generally in a low bushy tree. At night they climb up the tree, and either shoot the birds with blunt arrows, or even catch them alive with a cloth. In New Guinea they are caught by placing snares on the trees frequented by them, in the same way as the red paradise birds are caught in Waigiou, and which has already been described at page 536.

The great Epimaque, or Long-tailed Paradise Bird (Epi

THE LONG-TAILED.

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machus magnus), is another of these wonderful creatures, only known by the imperfect skins prepared by the natives. In its dark velvety plumage, glossed with bronze and purple, it resembles the Seleucides alba, but it bears a magnificent tail more than two feet long, glossed on the upper surface with the most intense opalescent blue. Its chief ornament, however, consists in the group of broad plumes which spring from the sides of the breast, and which are dilated at the extremity, and banded with the most vivid metallic blue and green. The bill is long and curved, and the feet black, and similar to those of the allied forms. The total length of this fine bird is between three and four feet.

This splendid bird inhabits the mountains of New Guinea, in the same district with the Superb and the Sixshafted Paradise Birds, and I was informed is sometimes found in the ranges near the coast. I was several times assured by different natives that this bird makes its nest in a hole

under ground, or under rocks, always choosing a place with two apertures, so that it may enter at one and go out at the other. This is very unlike what we should suppose to be the habits of the bird, but it is not easy to conceive how the story originated if it is not true; and all travellers know that native accounts of the habits of animals, however strange they may seem, almost invariably turn out to be correct.

The Scale-breasted Paradise Bird (Epimachus magnificus of Cuvier) is now generally placed with the Australian Rifle

Birds in the genus Ptiloris. Though very beautiful, these birds are less strikingly decorated with accessory plumage than the other species we have been describing, their chief ornament being a more or less developed breastplate of stiff metallic green feathers, and a small tuft of somewhat hairy plumes on the sides of the breast. The back and wings of this species are of an intense velvety black, faintly glossed in certain lights with rich purple. The two broad middle tail-feathers are opalescent green-blue with a velvety surface, and the top of the head is covered with feathers resembling scales of burnished steel. A large triangular space covering the chin, throat, and breast, is densely scaled with feathers, having a steel-blue or green lustre, and a silky feel. This is edged below with a narrow band of black, followed by shiny bronzy green, below which the body is covered with hairy feathers of a rich claret color, deepening to black at the tail. The tufts of side-plumes somewhat resemble those of the true birds of paradise, but are scanty, about as long as the tail, and of a black color. The sides of the head are rich violet, and velvety feathers extend on each side of the beak over the nostrils.

I obtained at Dorey a young male of this bird, in a state of plumage which is no doubt that of the adult female, as is the case in all the allied species. The upper surface, wings, and tail are rich reddish brown, while the under surface is of a pale ashy color, closely barred throughout with narrow wavy black bands. There is also a pale banded stripe over the eye, and a long dusky stripe from the gape down each side of the neck. This bird is fourteen inches long, whereas the native skins of the adult male are only about ten inches, owing to the way in which the tail is pushed in, so as to give as much prominence as possible to the ornamental plumage of the breast.

At Cape York, in North Australia, there is a closely allied species, Ptiloris alberti, the female of which is very similar to the young male bird here described. The beautiful Rifle Birds of Australia, which much resemble these paradise birds, are named Ptiloris paradiseus and Ptiloris victoriæ. The Scalebreasted Paradise Bird seems to be confined to the main-land of New Guinea, and is less rare than several of the other species.

THE PARADISE ORIOLE.

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There are three other New Guinea birds which are by some authors classed with the birds of paradise, and which, being almost equally remarkable for splendid plumage, deserve to be noticed here. The first is the Paradise pie (Astrapia nigra of Lesson), a bird of the size of Paradisea rubra, but with a very long tail, glossed above with intense violet. The back is bronzy black, the lower parts green, the throat and neck bordered with loose broad feathers of an intense coppery hue, while on the top of the head and neck they are glittering emerald green. All the plumage round the head is lengthened and erectile, and when spread out by the living bird must have an effect hardly surpassed by any of the true paradise birds. The bill is black and the feet yellow. The Astrapia seems to me to be somewhat intermediate between the Paradiseidæ and Epimachida.

There is an allied species, having a bare carunculated head, which has been called Paradigalla carunculata. It is believed to inhabit, with the preceding, the mountainous interior of New Guinea, but is exceedingly rare, the only known specimen being in the Philadelphia Museum.

The Paradise Oriole is another beautiful bird, which is now sometimes classed with the birds of paradise. It has been named Paradisea aurea and Oriolus aureus by the old naturalists, and is now generally placed in the same genus as the Regent Bird of Australia (Sericulus chrysocephalus). But the form of the bill and the character of the plumage seem to me to be so differeut that it will have to form a distinct genus. This bird is almost entirely yellow, with the exception of the throat, the tail, and part of the wings and back, which are black; but it is chiefly characterized by a quantity of long feathers of an intense glossy orange color, which cover its neck down to the middle of the back, almost like the hackles of a game-cock.

This beautiful bird inhabits the main-land of New Guinea, and is also found in Salwatty, but is so rare that I was only able to obtain one imperfect native skin, and nothing whatever is known of its habits.

I will now give a list of all the birds of paradise yet known, with the places they are believed to inhabit.