HERON. 110 



Aldrovandus has mentioned this bird, and suspected it to be a 

 mixed breed between the Common Heron and Bittern ;* but it 

 rather appears to belong to the Purple Heron. 



87.— CRESTED PURPLE HERON. 



Ardea purpurea, Ind. Orn.'u. 697. Lin. i. 236. Gm. Lin.i. G26. Borowsk. iii. 74. 



Faun. Helvet. Bechst. Deutsch. iii. s. IS. taf. II. Tern. Man. d'Orn. 364. Id. 



Ed. ii. 570. Sepp, iv. t. p. 353. Lin. Trans, xiii. p. 188. 

 Ardea cristata purpurascens, Bris.v. 424. t. 36. f. 2. 7d.8vo.ii. 321. 

 Le Heron pourpre huppe, Biif. vii. 369. PL enl. 788. 

 Crested purple Heron, Gen. Syn. v. 95. 



LESS than the Common Heron ; length three feet ; the wings 

 reach to the end of the tail, but the toes nine inches beyond it. Bill, to 

 the gape, six inches, colour brown, yellowish beneath ; irides yellow ; 

 top of the head crested, with narrow, pointed, black feathers, some 

 of them nearly five inches long ; lore, and round the eyes bare, and 

 yellowish ; from the gape to the hindhead a narrow streak of black ; 

 chin white ; the neck, for half its length, is rufous, marked with three 

 longitudinal black lines; the remainder cinereous olive behind, rufous 

 on the sides, and rufous white before, where each feather is dashed 

 with black, in shape long and narrow, hanging over the breast ; lowest 

 of these white at the ends ; the body above glossy olive ; some of the 

 scapulars long and narrow, tipped with rufous, and end in a point; 

 all beneath the body bright, purplish chestnut, with a band of black 

 from the middle of the breast to the vent ; under tail coverts white, 

 mixed with rufous, tipped with black ; thighs rufous ; edge of the 

 wing the same ; the wing coverts bright dark olive, part edged with 

 rufous ; some of the outer and greater ones dark ash-colour ; quills 

 dark ; tail five inches long, cinereous olive ; the legs greenish ; claws 

 dusky, the middle one serrated within. 



* Aldrov. An. iii. 408. 



