a 
of the Genera Tetrao and Ortyz. 135 
Trachea unusually large, and very strong. Gizzard dispro- 
portionately large, having but little muscular substance ; 
and the horny consistence of the inner coat, so conspicuous 
in most species of this genus, is in the present remarkably 
thin, in many so thin, that it can only be observed but by 
- careful examination. The pebbles in it seldom exceed 30 or 
40, generally white quartz. Two cecal appendages, mode- 
rately long, beautifully grooved or longitudinally fluted. 
The flight of these birds is slow, unsteady, and affords but little 
amusement to the sportsman. From the disproportionately small, 
convex, thin-quilled wing,—so thin, that a vacant space half as 
broad as a quill appears between each,—the flight may be said 
to be a sort of fluttering more than any thing else: the bird 
giving two or three claps of the wings in quick succession, at the 
same time hurriedly rising; then shooting or floating, swinging - 
from side to side, gradually falling, and thus producing a clapping 
whirring sound. When started, the voice is Cuck, cuck, cuck, 
like the Common. Pheasant. They pair in March and April. 
Small eminences on the banks of streams are the places usually 
selected for celebrating the weddings, the time generally about 
sun-rise. The wings of the male bird are lowered, buzzing on 
the ground, the tail spread like a fan, somewhat erect; the bare 
yellow cesophagus inflated to a prodigious size, fully half as large 
as his body, and from its soft membranous substance being well 
contrasted with the scale-like feathers below it on the breast, and 
the flexile silky feathers on the neck, which on these | occasions 
stand erect. In this grotesque form he displays in the presence 
of his intended mate a variety of pleasing attitudes. "His love- 
song is a confused, grating, but not offensively disagreeable 
tone,—something that we can imitate, but have a difficulty ok = = 
expressing,— Hurr-hurr-hurr-r-r-r-hoo, ending in a fum h llow 
| tone, : 
