O ELEMENTS Or OENITHOIOGT. 



as a national symbol of the Kepublic instead of that hackneyed 

 emblem the Eagle. 



South and Central America, though they have no Powls, 

 Pheasants, Guinea-fowls, or Turkeys, possess between fifty and 

 sixty large species of Birds, known as Curassows, of which the 

 Crested Curassow (Craxt aleetor) may stand as a type. They are 

 plain and sombre in colour compared with the bnlliant creatures 

 to which we have before referred. They are also more thoroughly 

 arboreal in their habits, being (like so many species which 

 inhabit that widest of forest-regions — Brazil) specially modified 



Fig. 4. 



tosegiBi,. 



Tlie Crested Curassow {Craa: aleetor). 



to live in trees, high up on which they construct their nests of 

 twigs. 



Australia has no birds to show, like those hitherto enumerated 

 although its curious mound-building Birds, or "Megapodes," 

 go by the misnomer of " Brush-turkeys,"— no doubt on account 

 of the wattled skin of the head and neck which some of them 

 possess. One handsome kind (Leipoa ocellata) has its plumage 

 decorated with eye-like markings. These Megapodes are cele- 

 brated for the mounds they raise to receive their eggs. The 



