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Show 346 AVES. light blue colour and a stony hardness, almost as large as its head. It is black; the lower part of the belly and the tip of the tail, white. It lays its eggs on the ground. Its original habitat is not exactly known. The trachea descends externally along the right side to behind the sternum, where it inclines to the left, and ascends to enter the thorax, through the fourchette. All its rings are compressed. There is another species, which, instead of the tubercle on the beak, has a red salient crest. The belly and tip of the tail are chesnut colour. It is the true Mittu of Marcgrave; Ourat mittu, Tern. Col. 153; Crax galeata, Lath.; Crax tomentosa, Spix, lxiii.( 1) PENELOPE, Merr. The Guans or Yacous(2) have a slenderer beak than the Hoccos; the circumference of the eyes is naked, as well as the under part of the throat, which is generally susceptible of being inflated. Several varieties of colour are found also among these birds, between which it is very difficult to establish specific limits. Those which have a tuft are sometimes of various shades of brown or bronze-Penelope jacupema, Mer. II, xi; sometimes spotted on the breast-Penelope cristata, L., Edw. 13;(3) some· times black, with the same spots, and more or less white on the tuft and coverts of the wJngs-Penelope leucolophos, Merr. II, xii, or Pen. cumanensis, Gm.; Jacq. Beytr. pl. to; Bajon, Cay., pl. s, or Pen.jacutinga, Spix, pl. lxx. Some of them are intermediate between these two extremes,-Pen. pipile, Jacq. Beytr. pl. xi. The trachea, at least in the first, descends under the skin far behind the posterior edge of the sternum, ascends, is again flexed, and then continues its course towards the fourchette, through which, as usual, it gains access to the lungs. A spe· cies almost without crest, Pen. marail, Enl. 338, Vieill. Gal. 198, greenish-black, with {l) Add, Cra:c tuberosa, Sp. LXVII, a;-Cr. uramutum, Id., LXII. N.B. The Cluu:o:m~l, Buff. ( Cra:c vociferans) founded on a vague indication of Hernandez, cap· XLI, is not authentic. Sonnini even thinks it may be the Falco vulturinus. The Caracara of Buff. and Dutertre is the .JJ.gami (PsoPlliA.). . (2) Gouan and Yacou are the names of these birds in Guiana and Brazil. That of Penelope, given to them by Merrem, uesignated among the Greeks a specie~ of Duck, which, according to them, had saved the wife of Ulysses from drownmg when a child. f (3) The P. jacuaza, jacucaca, jacupeba, jacubemba, guttata, and arra cuan, ~ S~ix, L~VIII-LXXV, c~osely approach the P. cristata, if they a~e not m.ere v;: et~s of1t. The P. mara,z, Vie ill., Gal., 198, corresponds most w1th theJacuP GALT.. . INACEJE. 347 a fawn coloured belly, appears very distinct. Its trachea, in both sexes, forms a curve at the upper part of the sternum, just before it dips into the thorax. 0RTALIDA, Merr. Or the Parraquas, only differ from the Yacous by having but little of the naked space on the throat, and about the eyes. Only one species is known; of a bronze-brown above, whitishgrey beneath; top of the head red-Catraca, Buff.; PILasianua motmot, Gm., and Pitas. parraqua, Lath., Enl. 146;(1) Bajon, ~ay. pl. I. The cry of this bird is very loud, and articulates lts name. 'l'he trachea descends under the skin as low as the abdomen, and then ascends to enter the thorax. With these different Hoccos naturalists usually associate the 0PISTHOCoMus, Hoffmanseg.-HoAZIN, Buff. (2) An American bird of similar carriage, with a sho1·t and thick beak, the nostrils pierced in the horn, and destitute of membrane; the head ornamented with a tuft of long and very narrow atrd. slender feathers, which is distinguished from all the true Gallinacere by having no membrane between the base of the toes. It is th~ Phasianus cristatus, L., Enl. 337; Vieill. Galer. 193; greenish-brown, variegated with white above; front of the neck and tip of the tail fawn coloured; the belly chesnut. It is found perching along the margin of inundated places in Guiana, where it feeds on leaves and the ~eeds of a species of Arum. Its flesh smells strongly of castor, and 1s only employed as a bait for particular fishes. PAvo, Lin. · The Peacocks are characterized by an aigrette or crest on the head, and by the coverts of the tail of the male being larger than its quills, and capable of being erected so as to form a circle. The shining, lax and silky barbs of these feathers, and the ocelh\ted spots that decorate their extremities, are well known in the P. cristatus, L.; Paon domestique, Enl. 433 and 434. (The ~l) N.B. The fig. in the Pl. Enl. is bad, in as much as it represents the tail pomted. (~)?'his term was applied to the above biru by lluffon, without any proof, from an mdtcation of Hernandez, Mex. 320, ch. 10. VieiU. Galer., 193, calls it Sasa cristata, and improperly represents the beak as :tched near its commissure. It forms a genus very distinct from that of any other . the Gallinaceae, and when its anatomy is known, may become the type of a particular family. |