224 TRUMPETER SWAN. 



of their possessors; in the course of a dark and rainy night, one of the 

 servants having left the gate open, Trumpeter made his escape, and was 

 never again heard of. 



With the manners of this species during the breeding season, its mode of 

 constructing its nest, the number of its eggs, and the appearance of its young, 

 I am utterly unacquainted. The young bird represented in the plate was 

 shot near New Orleans, on the 16th of December, 1822. 



Dr. Richardson informs us that it "is the most common Swan in the 

 interior of the Fur Countries. It breeds as far south as lat. 61°, but princi- 

 pally within the arctic circle, and in its migrations generally precedes the 

 Geese a few days." 



Cygnus Buccinator. Richardson'' s Trumpeter Sxoan, F. Bor. Amer., vol. ii. p. 464. 



Trumpeter Swan, Cygnus Buccinator, Nutt. Man., vol. ii. p. 370. 



Trumpeter Swan, Cygnus Buccinator, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. iv. p. 536; vol. v. p. 114. 



Adult, 68; wing, 27. Young, 52^, 91. 



Breeds from North California northward. Fur Countries. Abundant 

 during winter on the Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, and in Texas. Never 

 seen eastward of South Carolina. 



Adult Male. 



Bill longer than the head, higher than broad at the base, depressed, and a 

 little widened toward the end, rounded at the tip. Upper mandible with 

 the dorsal line sloping, the ridge very broad at the base, with a large 

 depression, narrowed between the nostrils, convex toward the end, the sides 

 nearly erect at the base, gradually becoming more horizontal and convex 

 toward the end, the sides soft and thin, with forty-five transverse, little 

 elevated lamellae internally, the unguis obovate. Lower mandible narrow, 

 flattened, with the angle very long, rather narrow, anteriorly rounded, the 

 sides convex, the edges erect, inclinate, with about twenty-six external 

 lamellae, and about seventy above, the unguis obovate-triangular. Nasal 

 groove elliptical, sub-basal, covered by the soft membrane of the bill; nostrils 

 submedial, longitudinal, placed near the ridge, elliptical, pervious. 



Head of moderate size, oblong, compressed; neck extremely long and 

 slender; body very large, compact, depressed. Feet short, stout, placed a 

 little behind the centre of the body; legs bare, an inch and a half above the 

 joint; tarsus short, a little compressed, covered all round with angular scales, 

 of which the posterior are extremely small. Hind toe extremely small, 

 with a very narrow membrane; third toe longest, fourth very little shorter, 

 second considerably shorter; anterior toes covered with angular scales for 

 nearly half the length, scutellate in the rest of their extent, and connected by 



