SERILOPHUS LUNATUS, Gould.
Lunated Eurylaime.

Eurylaimus lunatus, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., part i. p. 133,—Ib. in Trans
—Gray and Mitch. Gen. of Birds, vol. i. p. 65,
Brit. Mus. Coll., Part II. sec. 1. Pare

Serilophus lunatus, Swains. in Jard. Nat. Lib. Orn., vol. x, Flycatchers, p. 242.—Blyth, Cat. of Birds in Mus
Asiat. Soc. Calcutta, p. 196.—Bonap. Consp. Gen. Av., p- 169, Serilophus, sp. 1. |

Eurylaimus serilophus lunatus, Horsf. Cat. of Birds in Mus. East Ind. Comp., p. 118. |

Serilophus lunulatus, Swains. Class. of Birds, vol. ii. p. 262.

Zool. Soc., vol. i. p. 175. pl. 25.
Kurylaimus, sp. 3.—G. R. Gray, List of Birds in

 

I wap the pleasure of making this beautiful species known to science twenty years ago, in a paper read at
the meeting of the Zoological Society held on the 10th of December 1833, my characters being taken from
specimens which had been shot in the neighbourhood of Rangoon by Major Godfrey. This paper, with
some observations on the other members of the genus, was subsequently published in the first volume of
the Society’s Transactions, on reference to which ‘it will be seen that I pointed out the several characters
in which it differs from them; I did not at the time, however, consider these of sufficient importance to
warrant its separation into a distinct genus; other naturalists have taken a different view of the matter,
and it now stands in all recent works as Serilophus lunatus.

Major Godfrey informed me that it inhabited; the thickest jungles, and that its food was found, upon minute
examination, to consist entirely of berries and fruits; he did not ascertain any particulars respecting its
nidification.

«Dr. Helfer informs us, in his MS. notes,” says Dr. Horsfield, “ that he observed these birds in societies
of thirty to forty, upon the loftiest trees of the forests in the Tenasserim provinces, and that they are so
very fearless that the whole flock can be shot down one after the other. They are of rare occurrence, he
having observed them only once.”

Head and crest dull chestnut-brown, beneath which a black band, commencing just above the base of the
bill, passes over the eye and extends to the occiput; cheeks and ear-coverts dull chestnut ; throat greyish
white, passing into the delicate grey of the under surface; on the sides of the neck the grey is interrupted
by a beautiful semilunar mark, consisting of silvery white feathers, elevated above the rest, and abruptly
terminated as if clipped by scissors; upper part of the back bluish grey, pase aoguie the bright chestnut
of the rump and upper tail-coverts ; wing-coverts and spurious wing black ; ipa and Secenuadles lazu-
line-blue at the base and along the basal half of the external web; on their inner web, opposite the blue, a

large patch of white; their apical half black; first four primaries tipped ee white, the Est of a
edged along the tip of outer web with white, and cn the inner web
hree last secondaries; tail black, the three
black; thighs black; upper mandible blue ;
i and toes green, behind fleshy brown ;

primaries and secondaries slightly
largely with chestnut, which is the colour of the whole of ihe t
lateral feathers largely tipped with white, narrowly edged with
under mandible greenish blue, edges greyish white ; front of tars
eyelash orange-yellow.

In some specimens the first four primaries have th
giving them a remarkably pointed appearance ; the rem

on the contrary, a broad indented and abrupt termination. he sides of the neck: these I had re-
In some specimens I find no trace of the beautiful lunate mark on the sides 0 :

: th sexes, I presume
garded as females ; but as Mr. Blyth states that he believes the mark to be common to both 1
Cc 9 °
those without it must be immature birds.
The habitat of this fine species is Rangoon and the

The figures are of the size of life.

e shafts prolonged in the form of slender filaments,
ainder of the primaries and all the secondaries have,

Tenasserim provinces.