The White and Whooping Cranes are birds of wondrous beauty. The first-named species has been not inaptly called the "lily of birds." The whole plumage, with the exception of the black quills, is white. The legs are red, as is also the face. Dr. Coues, an American ornithologist of great repute, relates how he once mistook one of these birds—the Whooping-crane—for an antelope. He and a companion saw what they "took to be an antelope standing quietly feeding, with his broad white stern toward us, and only about 500 yards off. We attempted for at least fifteen minutes to 'flag' the creature up to us, waving a handkerchief on a ramrod.... This proving unavailing, my friend proceeded to stalk the game, and crawled on his belly for about half the distance before the 'antelope' unfolded his broad black-tipped wings and flapped off, revealed at length as a whooping (white) crane."
Photo by W. F. Piggott] [Leighton Buzzard.
GREAT CRESTED GREBE.
Young grebes in down are beautifully striped.
Another very remarkable species is the Crowned Crane. This is an African species, and takes its name from the tuft of curiously modified feathers on the top of the head. The coloured plate gives a good idea of its general appearance.
The Seriema.
This is a very hawklike-looking bird; indeed, by some ornithologists it has been regarded as closely allied to the Hawks and Eagles, and more especially to the Secretary-bird (page [467]). Really, however, it is a very ancient kind of crane.
The Trumpeters, the Courlans, the Kagu, and the Sun-bittern are other ornithological puzzles. Concerning the precise affinities of these birds much is yet to be learnt; they are, however, undoubtedly related to the Cranes. The last mentioned is a small bird, with wonderfully beautiful wings, which it displays with great effect to its mate during the courting-season.