Volume 19, Plate XIII / Ornithology (Birds)

Blue-Bodied Roller

Coracias cyanogaster

The most splendidly coloured roller of western Africa, larger than the Abyssinian kind, its head, neck and breast enveloped in a hood of light drab or fawn glossed with green. A black mantle covers the interscapulars, the wings are brilliant mazarine blue with beryl-green quill bases, the lower back, tail-covers and underparts deep blue, and the sea-green forked tail bears two outer feathers drawn out into narrow filaments, the whole some thirteen inches.