Page:Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, Volume 6 (1802).djvu/271

Rh taken from a specimen sent from New South Wales as a present to Lady Mary Howe. I have also seen two other specimens in the possession of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks, which I believe have since been deposited in the British Museum.

SINCE I had the honour of communicating to the Linnean Society the foregoing description of the Menura, I have been favoured with both male and female of that extraordinary bird from my friend Governor King, by the Buffalo store-ship; and I am thereby enabled to lay before the Society a description of the different sexes. I find, indeed, that with a little deviation the same characters and colours will serve for both of them. The female, however, is somewhat smaller, being in length, from the crown of the head to the end of the tail, only 31 inches. The general plumage of the whole bird is of a dull blackish colour, a little rufous under the chin and throat, and of a brownish cast: on the scapulars, as in the male. The plumage of the whole body, from the breast to the vent, and from the shoulders to the rump, is composed of long, slender, thread-like, silky feathers, resembling fringe, of a dull grayish black; lighter on the breast, belly, and vent. The bill and legs, which are strong and furnished with large scales, as in the cock, are black. From the head to the rump 14 inches. The tail 18 inches, also of a dull brown black colour above and gray beneath. The two upper tail feathers are sharp pointed at the ends; the rest are rounded and darker in colour, and shorten by degrees, as they approach the rump, so as to appear cuneated. The two outer feathers are shorter than the rest, bent in form like those of the male, brown black above, of a pearly gray beneath; and the crescents, which are of