210 GREAT CAROLINA WREN. 



GREAT CAROLINA WREN. (Certhia Caroliniana.) 



PLATE XII.— Fig. 5. 



Le Roitelet de la Louisiana, PI. enl. 730, fig. 1. — Lath. Syn. vii. p. 507, var. B. — 

 Le Troglodytes de la Louisiana, Buff. Ois. v. p. 361. — Motacilla Caroliniana 

 (regulus magnus), Bartram, p. 291. — Peak's Museum, No. 7248. 



TROGLODYTES LUDOVICIANUS.-Bonavab.ts. 



Troglodytes Ludovicianus, Bonap. Synop. p. 93. — The Great Carolina Wren, 

 Aud. pi. 78, male and female, 0m. Biog. i. p. 399. 



This is another of those equivocal species that so often occur 

 to puzzle the naturalist. The general appearance of this bird 

 is such, that the most illiterate would at first sight call it 

 a wren ; but the common wren of Europe, and the winter 

 wren of the United States, are both warblers, judging them 

 according to the simple principle of Linnaeus. The present 

 species, however, and the preceding (the marsh wren), though 

 possessing great family likeness to those above mentioned, are 

 decisively creepers, if the bill, the tongue, nostrils, and claws, 

 are to be the criteria by which Ave are to class them. 



The colour of the plumage of birds is but an uncertain and 

 inconstant guide ; and though in some cases it serves to furnish 

 a trivial or specific appellation, yet can never lead us to the 

 generic one. I have, therefore, notwithstanding the general 

 appearance of these birds, and the practice of former ornitho- 

 logists, removed them to the genus Certhia, from that of Mota- 

 cilla, where they have hitherto been placed* 



* Of this bird, and some others, Vieillot formed his genus Tryo- 

 thorus, containing the larger wrens, with long and somewhat curved 

 bills, and possessing, if possible, more of the habits of the creepers. This 

 has, with almost universal consent, been laid aside even as a subgenus, 

 and they are all included in Troglodytes. Read the descriptions of our 

 author, or of Audubon, and the habits of the wren will be at once per- 

 ceived. " Its tail," says the latter ornithologist, " is almost constantly 

 erect ; and before it starts to make the least flight, it uses a quick 

 motion, which brings its body almost in contact with the object on which 

 it stands. The quickness of the motions of this little bird is fully equal 



