162 



Mr. A. Newton on the Harlequin Duck. 



of them clad with quaker-like simplicity in inconspicuous 

 drab, with bills and tarsi often apparently distorted or exag- 

 gerated, but wonderfully adapted by their all-wise Creator to 

 supply the means of sustenance in these arid regions. We find 

 here the order Struthiones ; the genera Otogyps, Crateroptis, Dry- 

 moica, Comatibis, Corospiza, Rhamphocoris, unknown to Europe ; 

 and others, as Erythrospiza, DromolcBa, Ammomanes, Pterocles, 

 rarely represented here, but universally distributed there, and 

 under many specific varieties. From the difference of climate 

 and physical geography, this was naturally to be anticipated. 

 It is only mentioned to prove the premises with which we com- 

 menced, viz. that, ornithologically. North Africa is a European 

 province, while the Sahara is as decidedly non-European, its 

 affinities being with Nubia and Abyssinia. 



XVII. — Remarks on the Harlequin Duck (Histrionicus torquatus, 

 Bp.). By Alfred Newton, M.A., F.L.S. 



The value of the characters afforded by the trachea in different 

 members of the Anatidce is so well known, that I make no apology 

 for presenting the readers of this Journal with figures of that 



<^ 



organ in a remarkably interesting species, the Harlequin Duck 

 {Anas histrionica, L. ; Histrionicus torquatus, Bp.). Of this 



