620
Place and
Manners.
9- -t- GREAT.
CROWNED P.
D escription.
P I G E O N.
brown, with a light reddilh tinge : the tail blue, terminated by a
fmall band of white.
This is found in the favannas of Jamaica, in the month of
January j perhaps in its paffage to fome other parts. Feeds on
berries : accounted good food, being lefs bitter than the White-
crowned Pigeon. It makes a mournful noife on the trees through
the whole ifland, and fometimes very loud and difagreeable. g
Columba coronata, Lin. SyJ}. i. p, 282. 17.
— ■ — — mugiens, Scop, ann.i. N° 179.
Le Faifan couronne des Indes, Brif. orn. i. p. 279. 6. pi. 26. f. i.— Buf. oif.
ii. p. 354. 542.— PI. enl. 1 z8.
Le Goura de la Nouvelle Guinee, Son. Voy. p. 169. t. 104.
Great-crowned Indian Pigeon, Ed<w> pi. 338. — Damp. Voy. vol. iii, p*. 2.
p. 93. Pi. 3.
Hr. Muf Lev. Mu/.
Q I Z E of a Turkey. The bill is black, and two inches longj
from the bafe of this pafies a dreak of black through the
eyes, and.a little way behind : the irides are red : the head, neck,
bread, belly, fides, thighs, and under tail coverts, cinereous blue:
die head is crefted ; the feathers which compofe it are four inches
and. three quarters in length, and of the fame colour, but the
webs are of a loofe texture : the back, rump, fcapulars, and upper
tail coverts, are of a deep alh-colour, with a mixture of purplilh
chefnut on the upper part of the back and fcapulars: the lefler
coverts of the wings are alfo deep afh colour, tipped with purplilh
chefnut; the greater ones, neared the body, alh-coloured within,
white on the outfide, and tipped as the others, this lad colour
occupying more fpace on the outfide than on the inner j the
greater
P I G E O N .
greater wing coverts farthed from the body are alh-coloured
within, and purplilh chefnut on the outfide and tip : quills deep
blackilh alh-colour : tail the fame, but of a light afh-colour at
the tip: the legs are blackilh *.
This ipecies inhabits the Molucca IJles and New Guinea ; and
has been brought to England alive. Buffon mentions five having
been at once alive in France. In fize it far exceeds any of the
Pigeon tribe j but its form and manners tell us that it can
belong to no other. Indeed BriJJon has placed it with the
Pheajants; and the Planches enluminees have copied that name;
but whoever has obferved it, cannot doubt in the lead to which
it belongs. Its note is cooing and plaintive, like that of other
Pigeons, only more loud in proportion. The mournful notes of
thefe birds alarmed the crew of Bougainville f much, when in the
neighbourhood of them, thinking they were the cries of the human
Ipecies. In France they were never obferved to lay eggs,
nor in Holland, though they were kept for fome time: but Scopoli
allures us, that the male approaches the female with the head
bent into the bread, making a noife more like lowing than cooing
; and that they not only made a ned on trees, in the mena-
gery where they were kept, but laid eggs | . The ned was com-
pofed of hay and dalks. The female never fate, but dood upon
* % s they are Whitilh, fpotted with red ; and Seofoli, that they
are alh-coloared. We may fuppofe, therefore, that they vary in different
birds.
t P* 326.
I Damper fay. the egg is as big as that of a hen ; and that the bird builds in
trees.
6l I
Place and
Manners*