
30 REGISTRATION AND LABELLING. 
hand respectively, stretch with reasonable force, getting one 
wing-tip flush with one end of the ruler, and see how much the 
other wing-tip reaches. With large birds pull away as hard 
as you please, and use the table, floor or side of the room; 
mark the points and apply tape-line. — ‘‘ Length of wing:” Dis- 
tance from the angle formed at the (carpus) bend of the wing 
to the end of the longest primary. Get it with compasses for 
small birds. In birds with a convex wing do not lay the tape- 
line over the curve, but under the wing in a straight line. 
This measurement is the one called, for short, ‘‘ the wing.”— 
‘‘Tength of tail:” Distance from the roots of the rectrices to 
the end of the longest one. Feel for the pope’s nose; in either 
a fresh or dried specimen there is more or less of a palpable 
lump into which the tail feathers stick. Guess as near as you 
can to the middle of this lump; place the end of the ruler op- 
posite the point and see where the tip of the longest tail 
feather comes.—‘‘ Length of bill:” Some take the curve of 
the upper mandible; others the side of the upper mandible 
from the feathers; others the gape, etc. I take the chord of 
the culmen. Place one foot of the dividers on the culmen just 
where the feathers end; no matter whether the culmen runs 
up on the forehead, or the frontal feathers run out on the cul- 
men, and no matter whether the culmen is straight or curved. 
Then with me the length of the bill is the shortest distance from, 
the point just indicated to the tip of the upper mandible; 
measure it with the dividers. In a straight bill of course it is 
the length of the culmen itself; in a curved bill, however, it 
is quite another thing.—‘‘ Length of tarsus:” Distance be- 
tween the joint of the tarsus with the leg above, and that with 
the first phalanx of the middle toe below. Measure it always 
with dividers, and in front of the leg.—‘‘Length of toes:” 
Distance in a straight line along the upper surface of a toe 
is from the point last indicated to the root of the claw on top. 
Length of toe is to be taken without the claw, unless otherwise 
specified. —‘*Length of the claws:” Distance in a straight line 
from the point last indicated to the tip of the claw.—‘‘Length 
of head” is often a convenient dimension for comparison with 
‘es Se 





