438 WHOOPING CRANE. 



flag of plumage projecting over the tail, and in general by 

 their superior size. They also differ in their internal organi- 

 sation from all the rest of the heron tribe, particularly in the 

 conformation of the windpipe, which enters the breast-bone in 

 a cavity fitted to receive it, and after several turns goes out 

 again at the same place, and thence descends to the lungs. 

 Unlike the herons, they have not the inner side of the middle 

 claw pectinated, and, in this species at least, the hind toe is 

 short, scarcely reaching the ground. 



The vast marshy flats of Siberia are inhabited by a crane 

 very much resembling the present, with the exception of the 

 bill and legs being red ; like those of the present, the year-old 

 birds are said also to be tawny. 



It is highly probable that the species described by naturalists 

 as the brown crane (Ardea Canadensis), is nothing more than 

 the young of the whooping crane, their descriptions exactly 

 corresponding with the latter. In a flock of six or eight, three 

 or four are usually of that tawny or reddish brown tint on the 

 back, scapulars, and wing-coverts ; but are evidently yearlings 

 of the whooping crane, and differ in nothing but in that and 

 size from the others. They are generally five or six inches 

 shorter, and the primaries are of a brownish cast. 



The whooping crane is four feet six inches in length, from 

 the point of the bill to the end of the tail, and, when standing 

 erect, measures nearly five feet ; the bill is six inches long, 

 and an inch and a half in thickness, straight, extremely sharp, 

 and of a yellowish brown colour ; the hides are yellow ; the 

 forehead, whole crown, and cheeks, are covered with a warty 

 skin, thinly interspersed with black hairs ; these become more 

 thickly set towards the base of the bill ; the hind head is of an 

 ash colour, the rest of the plumage pure white, the primaries 

 excepted, which are black ; from the root of each wing rise 

 numerous large flowing feathers, projecting over the tail and 

 tips of the wings ; the uppermost of these are broad, drooping, 

 and pointed at the extremities ; some of them are also loosely 

 webbed, their silky fibres curling inwards, like those of the 



