Red Shouldered Parrakeet

CRESTED GOAT SUCKER. Order III. Passerine. Genus XLV.

This bird is somewhat smaller than our European species, measuring only nine inches and a half in length. The general colour of the plumage on the upper parts is dark-brown, mottled and crossed with obscure whitish bars: the quills are plain brown, but five or six of the outer ones marked with dusky white spots on the outer webs: the tail is rounded in shape, and marked with twelve narrow bars of a dusky white, mottled with black, as are the various whitish marks on the upper parts: the under parts of the body are more or less white; but the fore part of the neck and breast are crossed with numerous dusky bars: the bill is black, but the gape and within yellow; the sides of the mouth furnished with bristles, as in other goat-suckers; besides which, at the base of the bill are ten or twelve erect stiff bristles, thinly barbed on their sides, and standing perfectly upright as a crest, giving the bird a singular appearance: the legs are weak, longer than in most of the tribe, and of a pale yellow colour; claws brown.

New Holland Goat-sucker

NEW HOLLAND CASSOWARY. Order VI. Struthious. Genus LIX. Cassowary.

This is a species differing in many particulars from that generally known, and is a much larger bird, standing higher on its legs, and having the neck longer than in the common one. Total length seven feet two inches. The bill is not greatly different from that of the common Cassowary; but the horny appendage, or helmet on the top of the head, in this species is totally wanting: the whole of the head and neck is also covered with feathers, except the throat and fore part of the neck about half way, which are not so well feathered as the rest; whereas in the common Cassowary, the head and neck are bare and carunculated as in the turkey.

The plumage in general consists of a mixture of brown and grey, and the feathers are somewhat curled or bent at the ends in the natural state: the wings are so very short as to be totally useless for flight, and indeed, are scarcely to be distinguished from the rest of the plumage, were it not for their standing out a little. The long spines which are seen in the wings of the common sort, are in this not observable,--nor is there any appearance of a tail. The legs are stout, formed much as in the Galeated Cassowary, with the addition of their being jagged or sawed the whole of their length at the back part.