CRESTED 
Pavo Cristatus. 
Le Paon. 
Le Paon. 
Crested Peacock. 
PEACOCK. MALE. 
Lin. Syst. i . p. 2 67 . 
Bris. Orn. i. p. 2 8 1 . pi. g 7 . 
Buf. Ois. ii. p. 2 Si.pl. 10. 
Lalh. Gen. Syn. ii. p. 668. 1. 
Though the Peacock has been so long naturalized in Europe, it is not a 
native of this quarter of the globe. The East Indies is the original coun- 
try tllis m °st beautiful bird, which has been the admiration of all ages, 
from that of King Solomon to the present time. This opinion is counte- 
nanced by Holy Writ, as the Peacock is enumerated among the valuable 
and rare commodities that were every three years imported from Ophir 
(probably Sumatra), by Solomon’s fleet. 
The male is about the size of a middling turkey, measuring from the tip 
of the bill to the end of the tail three feet eight inches ; the female is some- 
what less. Above the tail springs an inimitable set of long beautiful fea- 
thers, the shafts of each being furnished from its original to its extremity 
with filaments of a copper colour, and terminates in a flat vane, decorated 
with what is called the eye, or mirror; this brilliant spot is enamelled with 
the most enchanting colours, yellow gilded with many shades, green run- 
ning into blue and bright violet, according as it is viewed in different 
positions, and the whole receiving additional lustre from the colour of the 
centre, a rich velvet black ; those feathers reach beyond the tail, and are 
not included in the above measure; the longest of them in the subject now 
before me measured upwards of four feet : this train or tail, as it it falsely 
called, can at the pleasure of the bird be expanded quite to a perpendicular 
upwards, more fully to display their dazzling richness; these are cast 
every year, either entirely, or in part, about the end of July, and shoot 
