162 Mr. A. Newton on the Harlequin Duck . 
of them clad with quaker-like simplicity in inconspicuous 
drab, with bills and tarsi often apparently distorted or exag¬ 
gerated, but wonderfully adapted by their all-wise Creator to 
supply the means of sustenance in these arid regions. We find 
here the order Struthiones; the genera Oiogyps, Crater opus, Dry- 
moica, Comatibis, Corospiza, Rhamphocoris, unknown to Europe ; 
and others, as Erythrospiza, Dromolcea, Ammomanes, Pterocles, 
rarely represented here, but universally distributed there, and 
under many specific varieties. From the difference of climate 
and physical geography, this was naturally to be anticipated. 
It is only mentioned to prove the premise's with which we com¬ 
menced, viz. that, ornithologically, North Africa is a European 
province, while the Sahara is as decidedly non-European, its 
affinities being with Nubia and Abyssinia. 
XVII .—Remarks on the Harlequin Duck (Histrionicus torquatus, 
Bp.). By Alfred Newton, M.A., F.L.S. 
The value of the characters afforded by the trachea in different 
members of the Anatidce is so well known, that I make no apology 
for presenting the readers of this Journal with figures of that 
organ in a remarkably interesting species, the Harlequin Duck 
(Anas histrionica , L.; Histrionicus torquatus, Bp.). Of this 
