xxix CRESTS OR TOP-KNOTS 355 



nected with this important structure, not only in regard 

 to colour, width, and length, but also the relation of the 

 two parts to each other. The specific name often 

 conveys information about the sounds the bird makes, 

 for it may whoop, trumpet, sing, chatter, warble, babble 

 or hum ; it may tell of its disposition, whether sociable, 

 solitary, or pugnacious. Sometimes the name of the 

 country in which the bird lives is indicated, or it may be 

 the name of the collector or the ornithologist who first 

 made it "new to science." Eponymous specific names 

 are sometimes dignified with an initial capital. 



Some scientific names are short and expressive : 

 Merops viridis is a green bee-eater ; Ardea alba, 

 a white heron ; Anas cristata, a crested duck ; and 

 Haliaetus vocifer, the screaming eagle. It often 

 happens that a bird with a short name has a long 

 one in ornithologic language. The entertaining brown 

 and white chat so abundant and attractive around 

 some of the lakes in the Rift \ 7 alley becomes 

 Myrmecociclila cryptoleuca in the museum catalogue. 

 The longest name belongs to the saddle-billed stork, 

 Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis, for it consists of 

 twenty-eight letters ; the beak of this bird is nearly 

 27 cm. long, and the ugliness of the generic name 

 equals that of the bird to which it is applied : in 

 this instance the length of name also coincides with the 

 size of the subject, for it is a giant among birds. The 

 spoonbilled sandpiper, Eurynorhynchus pygmceus, runs 

 this stork close for letters and for eccentricity of 

 bill. Although such uncouth names excite mirth 

 among the uninitiated, they are indispensable to the 

 student. 



The majority of birds possessing a top-knot usually 

 have this fact referred to in their common as well 

 as their scientific names. Crested or cristatus is 

 a title of distinction among birds, like a knighthood 

 among men. The term crest applies to the plume 

 on a helmet as well as to the mark of ownership 



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