Volume I Part 26 (1/2)

P. discolor. Red-shouldered Parakeet. _White's Voyage, pl. at p._ 263.

La Perruche Banks. _Le Vaill, pl._ 50.

This is another of the splendid little Parakeets inhabiting the forests of New Holland; and vivid as the colouring may appear in our figure, it sinks into dullness when compared with the bird itself. Dr. Shaw was the first who described it in White's Voyage to New South Wales, where it is badly represented. It has been since figured by Le Vaillant, probably from a female or imperfect specimen, as the tail is represented by far too short, and the colours not quite agreeing with that in my collection.

Total length eleven inches. The upper plumage bright green, tinged with blue on the sides of the neck, lighter and yellowish beneath; the crown of the head sapphire or violet-blue, with a crimson belt in front, and a large patch of the same round the chin; paler spots of this colour are also in front of the neck, breast, flanks, and under tail-covers; the under wing-covers are deep crimson, as well as the inner shafts of some of the lesser covers outside; the shoulders dark blood-colour; the outer wing-covers deep-blue on the margin of the wings, gradually changing to a vivid blue, which blends with the green. Quills black glossed with violet, margined externally and internally with yellow. Tail near five inches long, the middle feathers dark rufous tipped with blueish; the rest more or less rufous at the base, and s.h.i.+ning blue beyond. Bill and legs pale.

Pl. 63

[Ill.u.s.tration]

AMMODYTES.

_Sand-Lance._

GENERIC CHARACTER.

_Corpus gracile, teretiusculum, polyedrum, elongatum, squamis vix conspicuis. Labium superius duplicatum; mandibula inferior angusta, ac.u.minata. Membrana branchiostega septem-radiata. Pinna dorsalis corpore pene aequalis, radiis simplicibus flexilibus._

Typus Genericus _Ammodytes Tobia.n.u.s_. Linn.

Body slender, roundish, many-sided, with minute scales. Upper lip doubled; lower jaw narrow pointed. Gill membrane seven-rayed. Dorsal fin nearly as long as the body, with simple flexible rays.

Generic Type _Sand-Lance_. Pennant.

OBS. The _Ammodytes cicerelus_ of my friend Professor Rafinesque must be different from _A. siculus_

AMMODYTES Siculus.

_Sicilian Sand-Lance._

_A. pinna dorsali sinuata, in medio angustata, pone anum altiore._

Dorsal fin sinuated, narrowed in the middle and broadest behind.

Of this genus, hitherto considered as possessing only a unique example, we were fortunate in discovering while in Sicily the new species now figured, and which early in the year visit the coasts near Palermo and Messina in prodigious quant.i.ties. There is no striking difference between this and _A.

Tobia.n.u.s_, excepting the extraordinary shape of the dorsal fin, which is invariably undulated and narrowed in the middle. It never grows to a size exceeding the figure, and is usually much less; while the British species is often found double the length. Like that, also, _A. Siculus_ has the lateral line running close to the dorsal fin; for the fine line in the middle of the side, as Lacepede has well observed, is that only which connects the muscles. That author likewise mentions, that the jaws in _A.