BIRD& COLLECTED IS JAPAN. 229 



Our figure is much reduced, but the outline of the head and hill is of the size of life. 

 For an instance of the extensive migration of the wading birds, the reader is referred to the 

 species immediajtely following, (Totanus brevipes.) 



TOTANUS BREVIPES, Vieillot. 



Totanus brevipes, Vieill. Nouv. Diet. 6, p. 419, (1816.) 



Totanus fuliginosus, G-ould Voy. Beagle, Birds, p. 130, (1841.) 



Scolopax undulata, Foster Desc. An., p. 173, (1844.) 



Totanus pulverulentus, Miiller Verh., p. 153, (1844.) 



Totanus oceanicus, Lesson Comp. Buff., p. 244, (1847.) 



Totanus Polynesia, Peale Voy. Vincennes and Peacock, Birds, p. 237, (1848.) 



Tringa glareola, Pallas Zoog. Ross. As. 2, p. 194, (1831.) 



Temm. and Scbleg. Fann. Jap. Aves, pi. 65. 



This appears to be a very extensively diffused species, extending its range over almost the 

 entire temperate and tropical regions of the Pacific ocean. We find no distinction between 

 specimens in the present collection from Japan and others from the Sandwich islands and 

 Australia. The latter are in the museum of the Philadelphia academy, and are from the fine 

 Australian collection of Mr. Gould, now belonging to the institution just mentioned. Those 

 are the types of Totanus yriseopygius, as cited above, and figured by that distinguished author 

 in his Birds of Australia, which, for all that we can see, are specifically identical with other 

 specimens now before us from the Feejee islands, the Sandwich islands, and other localities, and 

 also the present from Japan. The Australian bird may be slightly smaller than those from 

 more northern localities, a character not entirely to be relied on, as shown in prepared specimens. 



This bird is found also in the northwestern, and perhaps the western, countries of North 

 America. Specimens were sent from Washington Territory by Dr. J. G. Cooper, while 

 attached to a party surveying a route for a railroad to the Pacific ocean, under command of the 

 Hon. I. I. Stevens. 



Specimens in the collection of the expedition are labelled " Hakodadi, May, 1854," and 

 " At sea, between Simoda and the Sandwich islands." 



We find the following relating to this species in his manuscript notes, kindly placed at our 

 disposal by Mr. Heine : 



"This bird was frequently seen on the sandy beach of the bay of Hakodadi. One specimen 

 (marked No. 6) was caught at sea, when the nearest land was 1,500 miles distant. It was very 

 much exhausted, and was knocked down by Lieutenant Nicholson with a speaking-trumpet." 



CORETHRURA ERYTHROTHORAX, Temminck et Schlegel. 



Gallinula erythrothorax, Temm. et Schleg. Faun. Jap. Aves, p. 121, (1850.) 



The Japanese Rail. 



Temm. and Schleg. Faun. Jap. Aves, pi. 78. 



This species is very similar to, if not identical with, O. rubiginosa, Temm. pi. col. 357, 

 which is the same as G. rufescens, Vieill. Nouv. Diet. 18, p. 656. It resembles it so very nearly, 

 that all the specimens in the fine collection of the Duke of Rivoli, now in the museum of the 

 Philadelphia Academy, bear the latter designation. The only apparent difference is the slightly 

 larger size of the Japanese bird, a character which appears to be constant, and is carefully 

 pointed out in Fauna Japonica. 



The present bird belongs to the genus Corethrura, of Reichenbach, a singularly natural and 



