268 SKETCHES OF EUROPEAN ORNITHOLOGY. 



racters. A more apt and significant designation might be surely 

 taken from the bright and strongly-marked colours of the bird. 

 The generic characters may be seen in Temminck, Manuel d' Orni- 

 thologies p. 418 ; Selby, Illustrations of British Ornithology, vol. !._, 

 p. 135 ; and Gould's letter-press accompanying the Plate. The ge- 

 nus, Alcedo, composes, with Merops, the seventh Order, Alcyones^ of 

 Temminck ; and constitutes, alone, the fifth Family, Haley onidoSj 

 of the British Insessores, of Vigors and Selby. The colouring of 

 the Kingsfisher by Mr. Gould, is as extraordinarily accurate as soft 

 and splendid. The figure, however, as regards the body of the bird, 

 is unnaturally thick and clumsy ; and by no means equal, in fidelity 

 and spirit, to the more humble production of Bewick's graver : nor 

 is the attitude of the voracious little creature, silently watching 

 over the stream for its finny prey, in our opinion, so strikingly 

 characteristic, as that which has emanated from the genius-inspired 

 hand of the rude and self-taught Northumbrian Ornithographer. 



Plate IV. — The Goosander, Mergus Merganser j — Grand 



Harle, Fr., — Mergo Oca Marina e Mergo Dominicano, It , — Gan- 

 sensager oder Taucher-Gans, G. This species, the largest of the 

 genus, is the Green-headed Goosander, of Fleming (the Merganser, 

 of other Ornithologists) ; and should have a Latin specific designa- 

 tion, founded upon this unvarying character of the adult male bird. 

 The female differs from the male, not only in inferiority of size, in 

 the rufous-brown colour of the head, neck, and crest, and less bril- 

 liant orange-red hue of bill, iris, and tarsus ; but in the absence of 

 those peculiarities of anatomical structure which the windpipe of 

 the latter constantly exhibits. The respiratory tube of the male 

 presents two enlargements previously to its termination in the bony 

 labyrinth at what may be correctly termed its sternal extremity. 

 The trachea of the female is alike destitute of such dilatations, 

 and of the labyrinth. These marked differences of internal or- 

 ganization and of colouring, formerly led to the erroneous infer- 

 ence, — still farther confirmed by the close resemblance which the 

 plumage of the male, during the first year, exhibits to the plumage 

 of the female,— that the latter constituted a genus perfectly distinct 

 from the Merganser; which hence became the Mergus Castor of 

 the green-headed Gmelin, — the Dun Diver or Sparling-Fowl of 



