BIRDS. 525 



stains for a long time the white striae and spots on the 

 ixiliarv feathers; and does not completely assume the uni- 

 form black color of the male for three years. The same 

 excellent observer remarks that in the spring of the 

 second year the female spoon-bill (Platalea) of China 

 resembles the male of the first year, and that apparently it 

 is not until the third spring that she acquires the same 

 adult plumage as that possessed by the male at a much 

 earlier age. The female Bomhy cilia carolinensis differs 

 very little from the male, but the appendages, which like 

 beads of red sealing-wax ornament the wing-feathers,* are 

 not developed in her so early in life as in the male. In the 

 male of an Indian paroquet (Palwornis javanicus) the 

 upper mandible is coral-red from his earliest youth, but in 

 the female, as Mr. Blyth has observed with caged and wild 

 birds, it is at first black and does not become red until the 

 bird is at least a year old, at which age the sexes resemble 

 each other in all respects. Both sexes of the wild turkey 

 are ultimately furnished with a tuft of bristles on the 

 breast, but in two-year-old birds the tuft is about four 

 inches long in the male and hardly apparent in the female; 

 when, however, the latter has reached her fourth year, it is 

 from four to five inches in length, f 



These cases must not be confounded with those where 

 diseased or old females abnormally assume masculine char- 

 acters, nor with those where fertile females, while young, 

 acquire the characters of the male, through variation or 

 some unknown cause. I But all these cases have so much 



* When the male courts the female, these ornaments are vibrated, 

 and " are shown off to great advantage," on the outstretched wings: 

 A. Leith Adams, "Field and Forest Rambles," 1873, p. 153. 



f On Ardetta, Translation of Cuvier's "Regne Animal," by Mr. 

 Blvth, foot note p. 159. On the Peregrine Falcon, Mr. Blvth, in 

 Charles worth's "Mag. of Nat. Hist.," vol. i, 1837, p. 304. On 

 Dicrurus, " Ibis," 1863, p. 44. On the Platalea, " Ibis," vol. vi, 1864, 

 p 366 On the Bombycilla, Audubon's " Ornitholog. Biography," 

 vol. i, p 229. On the Palaeornis, see, also, Jerdon, "Birds of India," 

 vol. i, p 263 On the wild turkey, Audubon, ibid, vol. i, p. 15; but 

 I hear from Judge Caton that in Illinois the female very rarely 

 acquires a tuft. Analogous cases with the females of Petrocossyphus 

 are given by Mr. R. Sharpe, " Proc. Zoolog. Soc," 1872, p. 496. 



I Of these latter cases Mr. Blyth has recorded (Translation of 

 Cuvier's " Regne Animal," p. 158) various instances with Lanius, 

 Ruticilla, Linaria and Anas. Audubon has also recorded a similar 

 case (" Ornith. Biog.," vol. v, p. 519) with Pyranga cestiva. 



