Adult Male. Plate C. Fig. 1.
Bill longish, slightly arched, slender, acute, subtrigonal at the base, compressed towards the tip; upper mandible with the ridge obtuse, the sides convex towards the end, concave at the base, the edges acute and overlapping; under mandible with the sides and back convex. Nostrils oblong, direct, basal, with a cartilaginous lid above, open and bare. Head ovate, eyes rather large, neck of ordinary length, body short and full. Legs of ordinary length; tarsus longer than the middle toe, compressed, covered anteriorly with six scutella, posteriorly with a long plate, forming an acute edge; toes scutellate above, the second and fourth nearly equal, the hind toe almost equal to the middle one, the third and fourth united as far as the second joint; claws rather long, slender, acute, arched, much compressed.
Plumage soft, tufty, slightly glossed. No bristly feathers about the bill. Wings short, broad, rounded: first quill half the length of the second, which is very little shorter than the third and fourth. Tail of ordinary length, much rounded, of twelve rounded feathers.
Bill dark brown above, yellow beneath. Iris hazel. Feet light brown. The general colour of the upper parts is dark brown, the sides of the head deeper, the fore part of the back brownish-black, longitudinally streaked with white, the quills externally margined with lighter brown, the tail barred with dark brown. A white line over the eye, extending down the neck; the sides of the latter mottled with light brown and grey; the under parts of a silvery greyish-white; the abdominal feathers and under tail-coverts tipped with brown.
Length 5 inches, extent of wings 6¼; bill along the ridge nearly 7⁄12, along the gap ¾; tarsus ⅚, middle toe nearly ¾.
Adult Female, Plate C. Fig. 2, 3.
The female differs very little in external appearance from the male. The black of the back is less deep, and the white lines are less conspicuous; the under parts, also, are of a duller white.
COLONEL BOON.
Daniel Boon, or, as he was usually called in the Western Country, Colonel Boon, happened to spend a night with me under the same roof, more than twenty years ago. We had returned from a shooting excursion, in the course of which his extraordinary skill in the management of the rifle had been fully displayed. On retiring to the room appropriated to that remarkable individual and myself for the night, I felt anxious to know more of his exploits and adventures than I did, and accordingly took the liberty of proposing numerous questions to him. The stature and general appearance of this wanderer of the western forests approached the gigantic. His chest was broad and prominent; his muscular powers displayed themselves in every limb; his countenance gave indication of his great courage, enterprise, and perseverance; and when he spoke, the very motion of his lips brought the impression that whatever he uttered could not be otherwise than strictly true. I undressed, whilst he merely took off his hunting shirt, and arranged a few folds of blankets on the floor, choosing rather to lie there, as he observed, than on the softest bed. When we had both disposed of ourselves, each after his own fashion, he related to me the following account of his powers of memory, which I lay before you, kind reader, in his own words, hoping that the simplicity of his style may prove interesting to you.
"I was once," said he, "on a hunting expedition on the banks of the Green River, when the lower parts of this State (Kentucky) were still in the hands of nature, and none but the sons of the soil were looked upon as its lawful proprietors. We Virginians had for some time been waging a war of intrusion upon them, and I, amongst the rest, rambled through the woods in pursuit of their race, as I now would follow the tracks of any ravenous animal. The Indians outwitted me one dark night, and I was as unexpectedly as suddenly made a prisoner by them. The trick had been managed with great skill; for no sooner had I extinguished the fire of my camp, and laid down to rest, in full security, as I thought, than I felt myself seized by an indistinguishable number of hands, and was immediately pinioned, as if about, to be led to the scaffold for execution. To have attempted to be refractory, would have proved useless and dangerous to my life; and I suffered myself to be removed from my camp to theirs, a few miles distant, without uttering even a word of complaint. You are aware, I dare say, that to act in this manner was the best policy, as you understand that by so doing, I proved to the Indians at once, that I was born and bred as fearless of death as any of themselves.