42 PURPLE GALLINULE. 
Weight of one individual 73 0z., of another 84, both males; of a 
fourth 7 oz.; of a fifth 54; and of a sixth only 43. | 
The female is somewhat smaller, but similar to the male, the frontal 
plate is less extended, and the tints of the plumage a little less vivid. 
The young are at first covered with black down. When fledged 
they are olivaceous on the upper parts, dull purple beneath; the bill 
dull green. After the first moult, the bill is light carmine, greenish- 
yellow at the end, the head dark purple; the plumage coloured as 
above described, but less brilliant, the tarsi and toes greenish-yellow. 
In a male bird, the tongue is 10 twelfths of an inch long, sagittate 
at the base, with conical papille, of which the outer are larger, slightly 
concave above, horny towards the end, which is thin, rather obtuse, and 
lacerated. On the middle line of the roof of the mouth anteriorly is a 
row of large blunt papilla, behind which are two rows; aperture of poste- 
rior nares linear. (Esophagus 7 inches long, of moderate width, its great- 
est diameter, at the lower part of the neck, where it isa little dilated, 8 
twelfths. Proventriculus 1,4 long; its glandules 1,4, long. Sto- 
mach a large and powerful gizzard, broadly elliptical, 1} inch long, 1,4 
broad, its lateral muscles large, the tendons covering nearly their whole 
surface, the left muscles 1 inch think, the right 7, the cuticular lining 
moderately rugous. Intestine 21 inches long, from 7; to 7% in diame- 
ter. Rectum 23 inches; ceca 2, their diameter ;% towards the end. 
Trachea, moderately extended, 5} inches long, its greatest breadth 
34,, its least 1,4. Its rings 130, very slender, unossified, collapsed, 
and owing to their narrowness in the middle line before and behind, 
seeming as if broken there ; bronchi with 15 half-rings. The contrac- 
tor muscles moderate, the sterno-tracheal slender ; a pair of muscles on 
the lower larynx, from the lower rings of the trachea to the membrane 
over the first bronchial ring. 
In the mouth was a small frog, in the pharynx two, in the cesopha- 
gus two more, a large piece of root, numerous fragments of insects, 
and a leach, the frogs 24 inches long. In the gizzard were seeds, and — 
fragments of white fleshy roots. 
