414 BLUE CRANE. 



BLUE CEANE. {Ardea ccerulea.) 



PLATE LXII.-Fig. 3. 



Arct. Zool. No. 351.— Caiesby, i. 76.— Le Crabier Bleu, Buff. vii. 398.- Sloan 

 Jam. ii. 315. — Lath. Syn. iii. p. 78. No. 45 ; p. 79, var. a.— A. cserulescens, 

 Turt. Syst. p. 379.— Planch. Enl. 3i9.—Peale's Museum, No. 6782. 



EGRET T A CMRULEA.—Jkkdys^,. 



Ardea cserulea, Linn. Syst. — Bona}}. Synop. p. 300. — Ardea cserulescens, 

 Wagl. Syst. Av. No. 15. 



In mentioning this species in his translation of the " Systema 

 Naturae," Turton has introduced what he calls two varieties, 

 one from New Zealand, the other from Brazil ; both of which, 

 if we may judge by their size and colour, appear to be entirely 

 different and distinct species ; the first being green with yel- 

 low legs, the last nearly one half less than the present.* By 

 this loose mode of discrimination, the precision of science 

 being altogether dispensed with, the whole tribe of cranes, 

 herons, and bitterns may be styled mere varieties of the genus 



month of January. In such multitudes were they along the borders 

 of the streams or passages which separate the sea-islands from the main, 

 that their loud and incessant noise became quite as disgusting as the 

 monotonous cackle of that intolerable nuisance the guinea-fowl." — Ord's 

 Edit. 



* I have never traced this species in any Australian collection, and 

 have little doubt that the authors of the assertion " that it is found there," 

 will turn out incorrect. This bird has all the characters of Egretta ex- 

 cept the colour, and will certainly belong to that division, though it has 

 been generally restricted to those of pure plumage. Bonaparte, in his 

 " Nomenclature of Wilson," says, "the young birds of the year, before 

 their first moult, are altogether pure white, and are therefore apt to be 

 confounded with the young of A. candidissima." Wagler in his excellent 

 " Systema " confirms this, and mentions that, in their further" change, the 

 upper parts are pale cinereous tinged with purple, beneath white, the 

 quills partly black partly white, the tail cinereous. It is curious that in 

 a species clothed with such rich and dark plumage the young should be 

 pure white, the colour of the true Egretta, while in some of those of 

 snowy covering, the young are a dusky greyish brown. If it can be mis- 

 taken in any state for Egretta candidissima, it will at once show where 

 it ought to be placed. — Ed. 



