MERULID.E. 173 



[36.] 1. Cinclus Americanus. (Swainson.) American Dipper. 



Sub-family. Myotherinae. Swainson. Genus. Cinclus. Bechstein. 



Cinclus Mexicanus. Swains. Syn., p. 367, No. 27. 



Pallas Dipper. {Cinclus Pallasii.) Bonap. Orn., iii., p. 1, pi. 16, f. i. 



Three specimens of this bird were procured by Mr. Drummond near the sources 

 of the Athabasca River, on the eastern declivity of the Rocky Mountains, between 

 the 54th and 56th parallels of latitude. It was previously discovered by the late 

 Mr. W. Bullock in Mexico ; but I am not aware that it has as yet been detected in 

 the intermediate country of the United States. Perhaps in its migrations it seldom 

 wanders so far to the eastward as to come within the tracts frequented by the 

 naturalists of the latter country. Several specimens, obtained in the same locality 

 and at the same time with Mr. Drummond's, came into Mr. Leadbeater's hands 

 through the Hudson's Bay Company, one of which has been described and figured 

 by the Prince of Musignano in his splendid American Ornithology. Mr. Drum- 

 mond made no notes of the habits of this bird ; but they are, most probably, very 

 similar to those of the British species, which is termed provincially, " Water- 

 colly," " Water-ouzel," " Dipper," or " Water-crake." This bird has the 

 singular habit, for a species strictly terrestrial in its structure, of walking under 

 the surface of the water on the bed of a stream, using its wings as well as its legs 

 to urge itself along in quest of aquatic insects or the ova of fish. Montagu also 

 states that it sings in a strong and elegant manner, with much variation in its 

 notes, many of which are peculiar to itself, intermixed with a little of the piping 

 of the Wood-lark.— R< 



It may possibly have originated in the brevity of our original notice of this 

 species *, that Prince C. Bonaparte has been misled in believing it was the Cinclus 

 Pallasii of M. Temminck, — a supposed Asiatic bird, sent by Pallas from the 

 Crimea, and described in the Manuel d'Ornithologie, i., p. 177, in the following 

 words : " Cinclus Pallasii, formes de notre Chicle ; tout le plumage, sans exception, 

 d'une seule nuance brune, couleur de chocolat. D'un envoi fait par le Professeur 



* Cinclw Mexkanus, cinereous-grey, head and chin brown : size of the European species. — Nob., in Phil. Mag., 

 June, 1827. 



