188 LAGOPUS CINEREUS. 



wings rather short and broad, the neck of moderate length and 

 rather slender, the head small and oblong, the feet short and 

 rather strong. As this bird has never been described with suf- 

 ficient accuracy, and as in its summer plumage it has been re- 

 presented, and indeed generally admitted, as a species distinct 

 from itself in autumn, I shall present a very detailed account 

 of it, and trace the changes in its plumage, beginning with its 

 full winter dress. In the first place then, I shall describe the 

 species as represented by a male and a female shot in Suther- 

 land in the end of December 1835, and received by me in the 

 beginning of the following month. In this, as in every other 

 instance, unless it be particularly stated to the contrary, I de- 

 scribe only entire birds, not skins. 



Male in Winter. — The bill is short and strong ; the upper 

 mandible straight and slightly declinate to the nostrils, then 

 arcuato-declinate, the ridge convex, the sides convex towards 

 the end, the edges straight, and ascending to beyond the nos- 

 trils, where they are much inflected, then declinato-incurvate, 

 sharp and overlapping, the tip compressed, rounded, and thin- 

 edged ; the lower mandible with the angle broad and rounded, 

 the dorsal outline straight, the back broad and convex, the 

 sides nearly erect and convex, the edges arched, thin, erect, the 

 tip rounded. 



The upper mandible is concave within, the lower deeply 

 concave, with a central and two lateral grooves, separated by 

 two ridges. The aperture of the posterior nares is oblong be- 

 hind, linear before, with papillate edges. The tongue is short, 

 broad, triangular, acute, notched and papillate behind. The 

 mouth is narrow, measuring seven-twelfths of an inch across. 

 The cESophagus is six inches and a quarter in lengih. It lies, 

 as usual, to the right of the trachea, which passes at first 

 directly along the middle of the neck, and at three and a half 

 inches from the top oj)ens by an aperture one inch long into the 

 crop, which is a membranous sac capable of being dilated to 

 the diameter of about three inches. The general diameter of 

 the oesophagus is about three and a half twelfths ; the proven- 

 tricular portion is bulbiform, with a diameter of five-twelfths ; 



