32 Monograph of the Cranes. 



an interesting encounter, but I am certain that this bird has suflScient courage for one. 

 The Demoiselle crane is easily domesticated when young.] 



The eggs of G. virgo have been carefully described by Dr. Bree. As 

 before stated, they are smaller and more elongated than those of the common 

 crane. Dr. Bree {Field, September 11, 1869) writes as follows: 



Mr. Cullen has kindly sent me six specimens for comparison, and with four in my 

 own collection, two of them from Mr. Cullen and two purchased from eggs sent home 

 by Dr. Cnlien, I am able to give a fair description of the egg. The size varies from 

 three inches and four-fifths to three inches and two-fifths in length, and two inches and 

 a fifth to two inches in breadth. The ground colour is a dirty pale green, and they 

 are more or less thickly marked with spots and blotches of umber brown — in some cases 

 more thickly at the larger end, while in others no such accumulation is seen, the blotches 

 and spots being more regularly diffused. In addition to the brown umber marking there 

 are blotches of a fainter dark colour. In one variety the egg is of a uniform light cinnamon 

 brown colour, thickly marked with spots of the same colour, but darker; and in two speci- 

 mens in my collection sent me by Mr. Cullen the ground colour is of a darker colour, and 

 the spots and blotches have a bronzy appearance, giving the egg somewhat the appear- 

 ance of that of the great bustard. Some of the eggs have blotches, others 'spots pi-edomi- 

 nant ; the latter rarely. One specimen sent me by Mr, Cullen is almost entirely and 

 uniformly spotted with brown upon a pale dirty green ground. When the eggs are 

 thickly marked at the larger end, the other parts are freer from blotches or spots. All 

 the eggs are more or less glossy. 



Though its geographic range extends to North Africa, it is decidedly 

 more of an Asiastic than an African species, being found abundantly (as we 

 have seen), even so far eastward as Mongolia, where it breeds, and it is sure 

 to occur more or less in Mantchuria and the huge realm of China. As Dr. 

 Bree remarks, "it is not rare in Turkey, plentiful in Persia, and eastward 

 inhabits the continent of India" (but only as a winter visitant). "It is 

 found in the south of Russia, in Greece, Turkey, and occasionally in 

 Dalmatia," (and, as a rare straggler, in) " Switzerland, the South of France, 

 and Heligoland. It is also found in various parts of (Northern) Africa. 

 Mr. Salvin notices having seen small flocks in the eastern parts of the 

 marsh of Zana. Canon Tristram also met with it in the north, and Capt. 

 Loche records its occurrence in the south of Algeria. " Dr. Leith Adams 

 informs me," continues Dr. Bree, " that it has several times been shot in 

 Malta during the cold season." My late friend M. Alfred Malherbe, in his 

 " Faune Ornithologique de la Sicile." also states that it appears " acciden- 

 tellement" in Malta and on the western and southern costs of Sicily. 

 According to Temminck, it has been killed both in Piedmont and Switzer- 

 land. Capt. Shelley, in his " Handbook of the Birds of Egypt," remarks 

 that "this crane ranges throughout Egypt and Nubia, but is far less 

 plentiful than the Common Crane, and nearly as shy." Over a considerable 

 part of India, as already remarked, it is by far the most abundant species of 

 its genus. There it is most commonly known to our countrymen as the 

 coolen. "The name Mlung," however, as the late Dr. Jerdon remarked, 

 " transformed into cooleyi, is wrongly applied to this species by many sporting 



