PSOPHIIDAE 



257 



with white flecks ; the upper parts are glossed with bronzy- 

 purple, the bill is greenish. A. scolopaceus, the Carau, Courlan, 

 Lamenting Bird, or Crazy Widow, ranging from Guiana to Argen- 

 tina, has only the head and neck streaked. Generally solitary 

 or found in family-parties, these birds conceal themselves by day 

 among reeds or damp forest-vegetation ; they rise with difficulty 

 after a preliminary run, and take low, brief nights, the legs hanging 

 down and the wings flapping slowly, while the latter are elevated 

 for a descent. They walk quickly and in stately fashion, limping 

 and jerking the tail ; at night they roost on trees. The resonant, 

 melancholy wail is varied by a clucking note, or by an angry cry 

 when breeding. The shallows of streams or marshes are diligently 

 searched for molluscs, which the formation of the beak enables the 

 bird easily to open or break, but small reptiles, insects, and 

 worms are also eaten. 

 The flat nest of herb- 

 age, placed among 

 reeds, contains from 

 ten to twelve white 

 eggs, as large as 

 those of a Turkey, 

 clouded with pale 

 brown and purple. 1 



Earn. IV. Psophi- 

 idae. The so-called 

 Trumpeters form a 

 single genus of six 

 species inhabiting 

 tropical South 

 America, and some- 

 what resemble long- 

 necked and long- 

 legged Fowls, the 

 beak being gallin- 

 aceous and the tibia 

 partly bare. The 

 long metatarsi are 

 scutellated in front ; the wings and tail are short, the ten primaries, 





FIG. 52. Trumpeter. Psophia crepitans. 



1 For the habits, cf. Sclater and Hudson, Argentine Ornithology, ii. 1889, pp. 159- 

 161 ; Gosse, Birds of Jamaica, pp. 355-363 ; Gundlach, J.f. 0., 1875, pp. 353-355. 

 VOL. IX S 



