The cloaca is about an inch in length and breadth. The trachea, when extended, is 8-3/4 inches long. The rings 170 in number, are osseous and circular, so that the organ preserves its cylindrical form under all circumstances. They are, like those of all Herons, of equal breadth on both sides, not broad on one side and narrow on the other, as has been represented. The contractor muscles are very slender, as are the sterno-tracheal; the former send down a slip on each side to the first bronchial ring. The diameter of the trachea is 2 lines at the upper part, 1-1/2 at the lower. The bronchi are short, wide, conical, of about 13 half rings. The right lobe of the liver is 2-1/4 inches long, the left lobe 1-1/2; the heart 1-1/4 in length, 8 lines broad, of an oblong conical form. The stomach contained remains of insects and crustaceous animals, together with a few seeds. TELL-TALE GODWIT. _TOTANUS MELANOLEUCUS_, VIEILL. PLATE CCCVIII. MALE AND FEMALE. It is my opinion that they who have given so much importance to the cry of this bird, as to believe it to be mainly instrumental in ensuring the safety of other species, and in particular of Ducks, have called in the aid of their imagination to increase the interest of what requires no such illustration. A person unacquainted with this Godwit would believe, on reading its history as recorded in books, that the safety of these birds depends on the friendly warning of their long-billed and long-tongued neighbour. And yet it is at no season more noisy or more vigilant than the Kildeer Plover, nor ever half so much so as the Semipalmated species, the reiterated vociferations of which are so annoying. It is true that the Tell-tale is quite loquacious enough; nay, you, Reader, and I, may admit that it is a cunning and watchful bird, ever willing to admonish you or me, or any other person whom it may observe advancing towards it with no good intent, that it has all along watched us. But then, when one has observed the habits of this bird for a considerable time, in different situations, and when no other feathered creatures are in sight, he will be convinced that the Tell-tale merely intends by its cries to preserve itself, and not generously to warn others of their danger. So you may safely banish from your mind the apprehension, which the reading of books may have caused, that duck-shooting in the marshes of our Middle Districts, is as hopeless a pursuit as “a wild goose chase.”