110 CRANE 
for in 1768 Pennant wrote that after the strictest enquiry he found 
the inhabitants of those counties to be wholly unacquainted with 
the bird, and hence concluded that it had forsaken our island. The 
Crane, however, no doubt then appeared in Britain, as it does now, 
at uncertain intervals and in unwonted places, shewing that the 
examples occurring here (which usually meet the hostile reception 
commonly accorded to strange visitors) have strayed from the 
migrating bands whose movements have been remarked from almost 
the earliest ages. Indeed, the Crane’s aerial journeys are of a very 
extended Kind; and on its way from beyond the borders of the 
Tropic of Cancer to within the Arctic Circle, or on the return- 
voyage, its flocks may be descried passing overhead at a marvellous 
height, or halting for rest and refreshment on the wide meadows 
that border some great river,! while the seeming order with which 
its ranks are marshalled during flight has long attracted atten- 
tion. The Crane takes up its winter-quarters under the burning 
sun of Central Africa and India, but early in spring returns north- 
ward. Not afew examples reach the chill polar soils of Lapland 
and Siberia, but some tarry in the south of Europe and breed in 
Spain, and, it is supposed, in Turkey. The greater number, how- 
ever, occupy the intermediate zone and pass the summer in Russia, 
North Germany, and Scandinavia. Soon after their arrival in these 
countries the flocks break up into pairs, whose nuptial ceremonies 
are accompanied by loud and frequent trumpetings, and the respec- 
tive breeding-places of each are chosen. 
The nest is formed with little art on the ground in large open 
marshes, where the herbage is not very high—a tolerably dry spot 
being selected and used apparently year after year. Here the eggs, 
which are of a rich brown colour with dark spots, and always two 
in number, are laid. The young are able to run soon after they 
are hatched, and are at first clothed with tawny down.” In the 
course of the summer they assume nearly the same grey plumage 
that their parents wear, except that the elongated plumes, which 
in the adults form a graceful covering of the hinder parts of 
the body, are comparatively undeveloped, and the clear black, 
white, and red (the last being due to a patch of papillose 
skin of that colour) of the head and neck are as yet indistinct. 
During this time they keep in the marshes, but as autumn 
approaches the different families unite by the rivers and lakes, and 
ultimately form the enormous bands which after much more 
trumpeting set out on their southward journey. 
1 A beautiful picture, representing a flock of Cranes resting by the Rhine, is 
to be seen in Mr. Wolf’s Zoological Sketches. 
2 A paper ‘‘On the Breeding of the Crane in Lapland” (JZbis, 1859, pp. 
191-198), by the late Mr. John Wolley, is one of the most pleasing contributions 
to Natural History ever written. 
