WHOOPEE. 51 



light coloured portion of the bill in these young swans, 

 along the lateral margin of the upper mandible, does not 

 extend beyond the perforation of the nostrils. The two 

 old birds have both a very decided rufous tinge on the 

 upper part and sides of the head, and beside the black 

 on the anterior portions of the bill, have also, in the 

 dried specimens, a slight black patch at the base, a band 

 of yellow about half an inch in depth, crossing the ridge 

 of the upper mandible between the two.* The yellow 

 on the sides of the bill in one extends slightly beyond, 

 in the other level with the nostrils ; but specimens 

 vary much in this respect. The old whooper killed in 

 February, 1871, is rufous on the upper part of the head, 

 but has no black at the base of the bill. In this 

 bird the bill measures four inches and a half in length, 

 being more than half an inch longer than in either 

 of the two other adult specimens. A remarkably fine 

 whooper in the Norwich Museum (British Series, No. 

 268), which was killed at Bowthorpe, in February, 

 1830, and is said to have weighed twenty-six pounds,f 

 also measures four inches and a half along the ridge 

 of the upper mandible, but has no black at the base. 

 In January, 1870, seven whoopers were seen to alight 

 in a meadow at Lyng, and two or three were observed 

 at Sparham and Witchingham about the middle of 

 February. In all these localities, the winding course 



* Since writing the above, I have examined the head of the 

 adult whooper, killed at Blakeney by Mr. Cremer, in November, 

 1871, which has also this black patch at the base of the bill. The 

 bill measures four inches, and the head and neck are strongly 

 tinged with orange-red, as were also, I am told, all the under parts 

 of the plumage. 



t St. John, in his "Natural History and Sport in Moray," 

 (p. 71) gives twenty- seven pounds as the weight of the largest 

 whooper he had ever killed. They usually varied from fifteen to 

 eighteen pounds. 

 H2 



