THE SCARLET TANAGER,
RhamphociElus brasilius, lylNN.
r p H I S is a native of Brazil, and is consequently widely known as the Brazilian
Tanager. The general colouring of the male is bright carmine; the wings, tail,
and thighs, dull black; the beak black, ^vith a white patch at the base of the lower
mandible. Length 74 inches; legs dark brown; iris orange-brown.
The female is brown, with the hind part of the back and the abdomen rosy
reddish.
Mr. W. H. Forbes, in his article on the Birds of Pernamhico, says:—"I met
\vith this splendid bird on the road between Iguarassn and Olinda, and subsequently
found it abundantly, in favourable situations, nearer Recife, as well as at
Parahyba and all along the line of railway as far as Catendc. It seems, however, an
essentially low^-country bird, and as the country rises in the interior, disappears.
This bird goes about, like several of the other Tanagers, in small parties, composed
chiefly of immature or female birds, so that the number of those seen in
the gorgeous crimson and black dress of the adult male is comparatively small.
It is always to be found in the low bushes and vegetation that grow about the
lower slopes and bottoms of the valleys in the neighbourhood of water, and is
never, according to my observation, found in gardens or the virgin forests. It has
a quick, rather loud, sharp, chirping note, of a single syllable, repeated several
times in sharp succession, which one soon gets to recognise. The Brazilian
name is "Sanger de Boi," i.e. Ox's blood, from the brilliant crimson of the
plumage of the male."
Dr. Burmeister and Carl Euler are in agreement with Forbes as regards the
localities haunted by the Scarlet Tanager, the former stating that it affects the
undergrowth of marshy districts and the neighbourhood of rivers, or the river
valleys themselves; but always wet groiind covered with scrub; and the latter
that its favourite haunts are the marshy situations in low-l3'ing country, on which
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