Description.—Above bluish black; broad superciliary stripe descending on each side of the neck white: beneath white; throat and sides of neck, and two breast-bands, the lower narrower and produced down the sides of the belly, black; bill and feet plumbeous: whole length 16·0 inches, wing 7·5, tail 2·0.
Hab. Coasts of Antarctic America and Falkland Islands.
At the mouth of the Rio Negro Hudson once picked up a specimen of a Penguin, believed to have been of this species, which had apparently just met its death by some accident. The range of this bird, moreover, appears to extend much further north, as it is well known to the Gauchos along the coast, who call it “Pajaro Niño” (bird boy), from its fancied resemblance to a small human being when it stands erect on the shore.
Darwin (Nat. Voy. chap. iii.) speaks of having seen numerous Penguins in the estuary of the Rio de la Plata, when approaching Monte Video in the ‘Beagle,’ in July 1832; and Graf v. Berlepsch tells me he has an imperfect specimen of Spheniscus magellanicus from the coast of Rio Grande do Sul, where it was picked up dead.
The “Jackass Penguin” is a well-known species in the Falkland Islands, to which it resorts in thousands for the purpose of breeding. Capt. Abbott tells us it arrives at the latter end of September and commences laying in its breeding-holes, almost to a day, on October 17. Some of these birds, however, are found on the shores of the Falkland Islands throughout the year.
[Order XIX. CRYPTURI.]
[ Fam. LIII. TINAMIDÆ, or TINAMOUS.]
The Tinamous constitute one of the most singular and characteristic types of the Neotropical avifauna. Until late years they were usually associated with the Gallinæ or Game Birds, but differ very widely from them in the conformation of the skull and in other essential points of structure, and are now generally regarded as forming an Order of their own, to be placed at the base of the series of Carinatæ. About forty species of Tinamous are known, of which eight occur within our limits.