158 HANDBOOK OF BRITISH BIRDS 



Migration by larger ones" {Field, March 31, 1888), 

 I have noted several cases of small passerine birds 

 being transported on the backs of Cranes — cases 

 vouched for by independent witnesses in countries 

 widely separated.^ But see Newton, " Diet. Birds," 

 p. 550, art. Migration. 



For an article on early records of this bird in 

 England, see Harting, Field, Dec. 23, 1882. Its 

 habits and migrations have been described at length 

 by Blyth in his "Monograph of the Cranes," 1881, 

 and by Prof. Newton, " Diet. Birds," art. Crane. 



Both the Demoiselle Crane (Grus virgo) and 

 the African Crowned Crane (Balearica pavonina) 

 have been recorded to have been shot in the British 

 Islands, the former at Deerness, Orkney, in May 

 1863, the latter near Dairy, in Ayrshire, in Sept. 

 1871 ; but as both these species are imported from 

 time to time with other ornamental waterfowl, it 

 is probable that those referred to had escaped from 

 a state of semi-domestication. 



Fam. OTIDID^. 



BUSTARD. Otis tarda, Linnaeus. PL 24, fig. 5. Length, 

 $ 48 in., ? 30 in.; bill, 2 in.; wing, $ 24-5 in, 

 $ 20 in. ; tarsus, ^ 6 in., $ 5-25. 



Towards the end of the last and beginning 

 of the present century the Bustard was one of 



^ A year after this article had appeared it was abstracted and pub- 

 lished as a chapter (without acknowledgment) in a little book entitled 

 " Sylvan Folk : Sketches of Bird and Animal Life in Britain," by John 

 Watson, 1889. 



