56 Monograph of the Cranes. 



measuring about 3.P0 by 2.65, the other being about 3.60 only with the same width ; the 

 shell is much roughened by numerous elevations like little warts, and is moreover 

 punctulate all over. The ground is a light brownish drab; the markings are sparse 

 except at the great end ; they are large irregular spots of a dull chocolate brown with 

 still more obscure or nearly obsolete shell markings.] 



Until comparatively quite recently, the ornithologists of North America 

 knew absolutely nothing of what is now generally recognised by them as 

 their Blue or Sandhill Crane, which is so abundant a species westward of 

 the Eocky Mountains. Wilson rightly conjectured that the two figures by 

 Edwards, pi. 132 and 133, represent adult and young of the same species; 

 and Audubon's two figures appear to me to have been " made up" — that of 

 the young especially — " from the depths of his own moral consciousness." 

 I do not believe that his coloured representation of the alleged young of 

 G. americana is like anything in nature ! His figure of the matui-e bird 

 exaggerates the aspect of the crimson facial skin, and does not properly 

 show the ashy occipital mark, as does that of Buffon better than do those of 

 either Edwards or of Wilson. It is easy to perceive that not one of these 

 figures is taken from the life, or the bill would not be represented as being 

 yellow, as it is by Audubon as well as by Wilson. Audubon writes, however, 

 " bill dusky, towards the base yellow," which indicates a description taken 

 from a dry skin. Nevertheless, the French-American ornithologist was 

 familiarly acquainted with the species, not only in the wild state but in 

 captivity, as he states that he kept one alive which was nearly full-grown 

 when he obtained it, " and its plumage was changing from greyish-brown to 

 white." Besides, he describes the habits of the bird admirably and most 

 correctly. He furthermore asserts : 



I had, in 1810, the gratification of taking Alexander Wilson to some ponds within 

 a few miles of Louisville, and of showing him many birds of this species, of which he 

 had not previously seen any other than stuflFed specimens. I told him that the white 

 birds were the adults, and that the grey ones were the young. Wilson, in his article on 

 the Whooping Crane, has alluded to this, but, as on other occasions, has not informed 

 his readers whence his information came. 



Neither does Audubon condescend to inform his readers that his two 

 figures of Grus americana, adult and young, are decidedly not studies from 

 the living birds, as it seems he fully intended us to understand. Neither he 

 nor Wilson had the remotest suspicion of the existence of any other species 

 of crane in North America, as that to which the name canadensis has since 

 been currently transferred, and so late as in 1844, when De Kay's volume on 

 the zoology of New York was published, nothing was still known to that 

 naturalist of the veritable Sandhill Crane, as now usually recognised by that 

 appellation ; and he remarks that " Dr. Bachman has conclusively demon- 

 strated the identity of the [supposed] two species." 



[The remarkable differences between the arrangement of the trachea in 

 the Whooping and Sandhill Cranes has been admirably illustrated and 



