[Illustration] In the digestive organs of this bird, there is nothing remarkably different from that of other Herons. The stomach contained remains of fishes and large coleopterous insects. The examination of the trachea, bronchi, and lungs, would not lead us to suppose that its cry is of the curious character represented, although it certainly would induce us to believe it different from that of ordinary Herons, which have the trachea narrower, round, and with broader and more bony rings. Although in external appearance and habits it exhibits some affinity to the Rails, its digestive organs have no resemblance to theirs. An egg presented by Dr BREWER of Boston measures two inches in length by one inch and a half, and is of a broadly oval shape, rather pointed at the smaller end, and of a uniform dull olivaceous tint. BREWER’S DUCK. _ANAS BREWERI._ PLATE CCCXXXVIII. MALE. The beautiful Duck from which I made the drawing copied on the plate before you, was shot on Lake Barataria, in Louisiana, in February 1822. It was in company with seven or eight Canvass-back Ducks. No other individuals of the species were in sight at the time, and all my efforts to procure another have been ineffectual. You will see that this curious bird is named in the plate “_Anas glocitans_,” the descriptions of that species having induced me to consider it identical with this. But on comparing my drawing with specimens in the Museum of the Zoological Society of London, I found that the former represents a much larger bird, which, besides, is differently coloured in some of its parts. The individual figured was a male; but I have some doubts whether it had acquired the full beauty of its mature plumage, and I considered it at the time as a bird of the preceding season. In form and proportions this bird is very nearly allied to the Mallard, from which it differs in having the bill considerably narrower, in wanting the recurved feathers of the tail, in having the feet dull yellow in place of orange-red, the speculum more green and duller, without the white bands of that bird, and in the large patch of light red on the side of the head. It may possibly be an accidental variety, or a hybrid between that bird and some other species, perhaps the Gadwall, to which also it bears a great resemblance. Bill nearly as long as the head, higher than broad at the base, depressed and widened towards the end, rounded at the tip, the lamellæ short and numerous, the unguis obovate, curved, the nasal groove elliptical, the nostrils oblong.