The sexes present no difference of plumage.
On examining the “Collection of Australian Drawings,” formerly belonging to the late A. B. Lambert, Esq., and now in the possession of the Earl of Derby, who kindly forwarded them to me for the purposes of the present work, I find that this species was long since described by Latham, under the names above quoted; in neither of his descriptions, however, does he mention the white ring around the eye, which forms so conspicuous a feature in the appearance of the bird, the want of which would have precluded the possibility of my believing them to be identical, had not the drawings named by Latham’s own hand proved such to be the case: the species should therefore stand as Zosterops cœrulescens, although Z. lateralis would certainly be more appropriate; unfortunately this fact did not come to my knowledge until after the Plate had been named, and the requisite number of impressions struck off. Latham refers to the 83rd Plate of the “Oiseaux Dorées,” as identical with his cœrulescens, but of this as I have indicated above I am doubtful.
Crown of the head, wings and tail olive; back dark grey, eyes surrounded by a zone of white feathers, bounded in front and below with black; throat, centre of the abdomen, and under tail-coverts greyish white with a slight tinge of olive; flanks light chestnut-brown; upper mandible dark brown, under mandible lighter; irides and feet greyish brown.
In some specimens the throat and sides of the head are wax-yellow, and the flanks are only stained with chestnut-brown.
The Plate represents the male, female and nest of the natural size, on a branch of the tea-tree of Van Diemen’s Land.
ZOSTEROPS CHLORONOTUS: Gould.
J. Gould and H. C. Richter del et lith. C. Hullmandel Imp.
ZOSTEROPS CHLORONOTUS, Gould.
Green-backed Zosterops.
Zosterops chloronotus, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part VIII. p. 165.
Jule-w̏e-de-lung, Aborigines of the lowland districts of Western Australia.