Volume 9, Plate XXVII / Ornithology (Birds)

Blue-Headed Ground Pigeon

Geophilus? cyanocephalus

An American ground bird plentiful in Cuba and Jamaica, where its gallinaceous habits earn it the name partridge, living wholly on the ground, running rapidly with drawn-in neck and pendant tail, and laying several eggs whose young soon follow the parent. About eleven inches long, it has an azure-grey head and chin, black throat and upper breast barred with white, a white facial band, and deep bistre-brown plumage tinged purplish-red.