GLYCIPHILA FASCIATA, Gould.
Fasciated Honey-eater.
Glyciphila fasciata, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., October 11, 1842.
All the specimens hitherto collected of this new species have been obtained from the Cobourg Peninsula, in the neighbourhood of Port Essington, where, according to Mr. Gilbert, it is far from being common, for in his notes he says, “I only once observed it near the settlement, and once again met with it on the neck of the peninsula near the main land. Its favourite haunts appeared to be the upper branches of the Melaleucæ, from the blossoms of which it collects its food. In both instances I observed small families of about twelve in number. Its note is a sharp shrill piping call, very rapidly repeated.”
The fasciated markings of the under surface, by which this species is at once distinguished from every other member of the genus to which it is at present assigned, and the circumstance of its moving about in small parties, would seem to indicate the propriety of its separation; as, however, it is precisely of the same structure, and agrees with them in the colouring of the upper surface, I have preferred retaining it in the present genus.
Its food consists of insects generally, the pollen, and occasionally the buds of flowers.
Crown of the head brownish black, with a small crescent of white at the extremity of each feather; feathers of the back very dark brown, margined with buffy brown; rump tinged with rufous; wings and tail dark brown, fringed with light brown; sides of the face, throat and under surface white; from the angle of the mouth down the side of the neck a narrow stripe of brownish black; chest crossed by a number of semicircular brownish black fasciæ; flanks and under tail-coverts buff, the former with a stripe of brownish black down the centre; irides reddish brown; bill greenish grey; feet aurora-red.
The figures are those of a male and a female of the natural size.