Mr. Selby on a new Species of Swan. 19 



yet firmer basis the correctness of the views he had advanced in his in- 

 teresting notice. Enough, however, had been done to create an interest, 

 and direct the attention of other naturalists to the facts thus disclosed, 

 and it appears that in consequence of Mr. Wingate's paper and fur- 

 ther communications from Mr. Atkinson, Mr. Yarrell entered into 

 the subject with his characteristic ardour, and his investigations soon 

 brought other facts to light, all tending in a greater or less degree to 

 strengthen and confirm the views of the original discoverer.* 



In a letter to Mr. Atkinson he has given a sketch of the sternum and 

 part of the trachea of a Wild Swan in his possession (PI. V. fig. 1), 

 shewing the horizontal bend it takes at the posterior part of the hollow 

 cavity of the keel, similar, though to a greater extent, to that of the fe- 

 male killed at Haydon Bridge, as shewn in PI. V. fig. 2. The bronchi 

 are also represented as very short, like those of the Newcastle birds, and 

 a considerable portion of the trachea as well as the inferior larynx, or 

 bone of divarication, enters within the internal cavity of the thorax, as 

 it is shewn to do in the original specimens of Cygnus Bewickii, PI. V. 

 fig. S. He also mentions having in his possession the sternum of a 

 young female of the new sort, in which, although the trachea has not 

 arrived at its full depth of insertion into the keel, still that part of the 

 sternum destined to receive the horizontal curve is already excavated, in 

 this respect exactly tallying with the appearance exhibited by the male 

 of Wingate's bird, as shewn in PL VII. fig. 3. The bronchi of this are 

 also short, and greatly inferior in calibre to those of the common Hooper, 

 and he further states that Mr. Leadbitter, of Brewer Street, London, 

 has seen three specimens of this new species, or, as he probably sup- 

 posed, variety of Wild Swan, within the last five or six years. Shortly 

 after this communication from Mr. Yarrell, a fortunate accident oc- 

 curred, which gave that confirmation to the views of Mr. Wingate, 



* Since writing the above, Mr. Yarrell informs me, that he has sent in a paper to 

 the Linnosan Society upon the new Swan, illustrated by several drawings, and has describ- 

 ed it under the specific name of Cygnus Sewickii. In this communication he mentions 

 having obtained two fresh specimens of the new bird, one of which he has presented to the 

 Linnaean Society, the other to the Zoological Society ; and he has also discovered several 

 other specimens in the collections of different individuals, some of them killed many years ago. 



