Part 67

No species of the genus alluded to has been discovered on the continent of America, nor in either of the American islands, except the above.

2. Hirundo phenicephala. Rafinesque, Annals of Nature, p. 4. (Lexington, Kentucky, 1820.)

“Head scarlet; back grey; belly white; bill and feet black. A fine and rare Swallow, seen only once by Mr. Audubon, near Hendersonville, in Kentucky; it must have been a wanderer, and is probably a native of Louisiana or Mexico.”

“Head scarlet”—enough said; Professor Rafinesque brings our ornithological ideas to a stand immediately. We never heard of a Swallow with the head of that color, exactly. But as Mr. Audubon’s name is brought in as authority, we think it possible that the bird alluded to in this description may have been a straggling specimen of a South American species, which has the head of a rufous color (Cortyle fucata, Temm., Pl. Col. 161, fig. 1). Rafinesque apparently gave his description and name without ever having seen the bird, or made further inquiry, and probably misunderstood or partly forgot the statement of Mr. Audubon respecting the color of the head.

Several instances of South American birds having been captured in the United States have come to our knowledge. We ought to have said, though, previously, that many more South American birds inhabit Mexico than are recorded in the books. Several specimens of Crotophaga sulcirostra have come under our notice, the last one of which was shot on an island in the Delaware, opposite to the northern portion of this city. Its plumage was perfectly mature and uninjured, showing evidently that it had never been caged.

3. Acanthylis saxatilis. Woodhouse, Sitgreave’s Report of an Expedition down the Zuni and Colorado Rivers, Zoology, p. 64 (Washington, 1853).

“Head and rump white; back, tail, wings, and side, black; beneath white; upper tail-coverts black; under tail-coverts white. About the size of A. pelasgia, and in its mode of flight the same.”

“This beautiful Swift I saw whilst encamped at Inscription Rock, New Mexico. Being on the top of this high rock at the time without my gun, I was unable to procure specimens. I had a fair view of the birds at this time, as they flew close to me. I descended immediately and procured my gun, but the birds by this time flew too high for me to be able to procure a shot at them. They were breeding in the crevices of the rocks. I was still in hopes of seeing them again along our route, but I had not that pleasure, it being the only place that I have observed them.”

This bird has not been noticed since the publication of the above description by Dr. Woodhouse.

4. Hirundo cinerea. “The Ash-bellied Swallow.” Ord, in Guthrie’s Geography, II. p. 317. (1815.)

This name occurs, without a description, in Mr. Ord’s Catalogue of the Birds of North America, in Guthrie’s Geography, as above.

Hirundo cinerea, Gmelin, is a native of Tahiti and of the Marquesas Islands, but has not to our knowledge ever been detected on the continent of North America. It belongs to the genus Collocalia, Gray. The Bank Swallow (Cotyle riparia) also was named Hirundo cinerea by Vieillot, but is given in Mr. Ord’s list as distinct from the present.

5. Hirundo rupestris. “The Rock Swallow.” Ord, in Guthrie’s Geog., II. p. 317. (1815.)

This name also occurs in Mr. Ord’s Catalogue, cited above. Hirundo rupestris, Scopoli, inhabits Europe and Asia, but we have never been informed of its appearance in America. It is a Cotyle.

We have now given all the species of Swallows known or supposed to inhabit the continent of America, north of Mexico.

As stated in a preceding page, Swallows are found in all countries except the Arctic regions, and are, so far as known to naturalists, birds of very considerable similarity of habits and of general characters. The various groups usually regarded as sub-families and genera are perhaps as easily distinguished in this family as in any other of the entire class of Birds, and it is one in which it is remarkable that almost every country produces species which belong to the genus (Hirundo) which is the type and apparently primary form of the family, besides forms peculiarly its own.

The types of great groups apparently more pre-eminently characterize the ornithology of Europe than that of any other division of the globe. In other words, Europe appears to produce the greatest number of species of birds exhibiting the fullest development of the especial characters of the groups to which they belong. It is very remarkable, too, that species are found almost throughout the world slightly aberrating, as it were, from European forms, or as though a typical form was produced with a greater or less degree of imperfection. Of this description of birds, the various species nearly allied to the House Swallow of Europe (Hirundo rustica), are a striking illustration. The American Hirundo rufa, and several Asiatic and African species, are only distinguished from that bird by characters of inferior value in specific identification. Australia, too, produces species, which, though apparently farther removed, are still similar. There are many other European birds which appear to occupy the same relative positions. The Goatsucker, Raven, Crow, Jay, and Peregrine Falcon, are instances. Of the European Conisostral birds, nearly every species has nearly allied forms in other regions.

In connection, however, with this subject, there are two considerations by no means to be lost sight of: Firstly, the extent to which the entire science of ornithology may be regarded as having been derived from European birds; those having been studied, and ornithological science being in some measure an induction from them by the fathers and founders of this branch of Zoology. Secondly, whether in reality the production of the higher developments in birds is not peculiar to the western portions of the two great hemispheres, at least in the northern regions of these divisions of the globe. We regard it as evidently the case in the Old World, and not less so in America. That the ornithology of western North America produces the highest developments of forms in this class of animals that are to be found on this continent, we think fully demonstrable. But at present we regard it as true that Europe produces marked ornithological types of divisions strictly natural.

There are about one hundred known species of Swallows, of which eighty-five are in the collection of the Philadelphia Academy. The South American birds of this family, for the greater part, belong to genera represented in North America. Of the genus Progne there are several species peculiar to that portion of this continent, several of which possess habits and manners very similar to those of the Purple Martin. The same may be said of several species of Acanthylis, two or three of which considerably resemble our Chimney Bird. Of the Bank Swallows (Cotyle), there are also several South American species.

III. SUB-FAMILY HALCYONIDÆ. THE KING-FISHERS.

General form short, thick, and robust; bill usually long, sharp, and adapted to striking and seizing their prey, which, in the greater part of the species, consists of fishes; wings generally long, and adapted to quick though not long-continued flight; tail usually short; legs short, frequently very strong; toes long, frequently partially joined together and flattened on the soles.

Of this extensive family, species are distributed throughout all the temperate and tropical regions of the world, though much more abundant in the latter. Many species habitually frequent the vicinity of the water, and subsist on fishes and small aquatic animals of other classes, but there are birds of this family that are found in the recesses of forests and other comparatively dry localities.

Two species only of King-Fishers have as yet been discovered in the United States.

I. GENUS CERYLE. Boie, Isis, 1828, p. 312.

Form stout and strong; head large; bill long, straight, wide at base, and suddenly compressed to the point, which is sharp; aperture of the nostrils large; wings long; second and third quills usually longest; tail rather short, wide; legs short; tarsi very short; toes moderate, united at their bases, flattened and padded beneath.

The two species which inhabit North America within the limits of the United States belong to this genus, and it contains also various others of different parts of the world. They are, however, most numerous in South and Central America and Mexico.

1. Ceryle alcyon. (Linn.) The Belted King-Fisher. Alcedo alcyon. Linn., Syst. Nat., I. p. 180. (1766.) Ispida ludoviciana. Gm., Syst. Nat., I. p. 452. (1788.) Alcedo jaguacati. Dumont, Dict. Sci. Nat., I. p. 455. (1816.) Alcedo guacu. Vieill., Nouv. Dict., XIX. p. 406?

Buffon, Pl. Enl., 593, 715; Catesby’s Carolina, I. pl. 69; Wilson, Am. Orn., III. pl. 23, fig. 1; Aud., B. of Am., pl. 77, Oct. ed. IV. pl. 255.