CRATEROPUS JARDINII. 
innermost secondaries but very little shorter than the primaries. The 4th 
primary quill feather longest, and scarcely exceeding the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th, 
the 3rd shorter than the 8th, and not quite so long as the shortest of the se- 
condaries ; the 1st about half the length of the 4th. Tail broad and rounded 
at the extremity. The feathers of the head, neck, throat, and breast, rigid : 
those immediately in front of the eyes wiry and decomposed. 
DIMENSIONS. 
Inches. Lines. 
Length from the tip of the bill to the 
extremity of tho tail 10 0 
of the tail 5 0 
of the wings when folded.. — 4 6 
of the bill from the angle of 
the mouth 
Inches. Lines. 
Length of the tarsus 1 6 
of the hinder toe 0 5 
of the middle toe 0 8^ 
In the female the general colours are less bright, and the white spots are 
not so pure, particularly those on the throat and breast. 
The first specimens of this bird were obtained in latitude 25° 24' S., and, as we have reason 
to believe, upon the extreme limit of its southern range. Where the species was first disco- 
vered, only a very few specimens were observed ; but, by the time we had reached a degree 
more to the northward, they occurred in great abundance. Spots covered with reeds, such as 
are seen along the margins of many of the rivers of the country they inhabit, appeared to form 
their favorite feeding places ; and though, when disturbed, they would leave those for a time, 
and take up their abode among the brush— wood with which the banks of the streams were 
more or less covered, they invariably returned to the haunts they had left when the cause 
which led them to remove had ceased to exist. While lodged among the reeds they were 
almost incessantly in motion ; and, from their being generally associated in great numbers, the 
noise occasioned, partly by their flitting from one stein to another or climbing, and partly by 
the harsh cries they uttered, more especially on the appearance of danger, rendered even a tem- 
porary residence in the vicinity of their haunts quite disagreeable. Though they evidently pre- 
ferred, as resorts, the situations described, yet, where reeds did not occur, they were occa- 
sionally found among the brushwood remote from rivers ; and in these positions they also 
displayed an extremely restless disposition ; scarcely were they observed to enter a bush or 
thicket before they were seen leaving it from the opposite side, for an adjacent one. Though 
such was their common practice, there were times when they appeared less disposed to hasty 
changes, and when they were to be noticed, not simply following a tortuous course, but even 
ascending and descending among the branches ; nay, even visiting the ground below and 
around the bushes. As far as we had opportunities of judging, they feed exclusively upon in- 
sects; and those which were killed when among the reeds, seemed to have committed great 
havoc upon the larvae of Gryllidce, &c. while those obtained among the biushvvood appeared 
principally to have fed upon coleopterous insects. 
