136 NATURAL HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



at that moment, if one is sufficiently near, the inhalation of air into the chest may be 

 faintly heard. The note is of great strength and volume, and is still distinguishable a 

 couple of miles away, if the day should be calm. The food, as far as I have been able 

 to ascertain, is gathered from the floating duck-weed and other vegetable matter of the 

 swamps. One has to be on one's guard against the formidable wing-spurs on laying 

 hold of a wounded chaha. On one such occasion, a stroke aimed at my face as I 

 stooped to pick the bird up was very nearly successful ; the spur caught in my coat- 

 collar, and I was almost pulled out of the saddle by the bird's weight. I have seen a 

 young bird, as yet unable to fly, beat off and follow up a dog, striking quickly and 

 heavily, the half-folded wings being used alternately. Well might Mr. Durnford 

 express surprise at the breeding-habits of this species. At the end of June (midwinter) 

 he took nests with eggs. But September and October constitute the real breeding 

 season, when the bulk of the birds lay. The nest is a shallow, light construction, 

 built of dry rushes, with a hollow on the top for the eggs. The foundation is in the 

 water. Four is the largest number of young I have seen in one brood ; but the clutch 

 of eggs reaches as many as six. These are of a white color, occasionally tinged with 

 light buff, oval-shaped and smooth-shelled. The young, when hatched, is covered 

 with an abundance of beautiful, soft down, of a yellow-brown color. In a very few 

 days they leave the nest and follow the parent birds, generally remaining in the swamps 

 or close to them." 



It is needless here to enlarge upon the characters peculiar to the ANATOIDE^E, 

 the ' duck tribe,' in its widest sense, since few groups are better known to the general 

 reader. It is one of the best circumscribed super-families of recent birds, and its dis- 

 tinguishing characters so well marked externally, that nobody fails to recognize any 

 member at an instant, be it a swan, a goose, a duck, or a merganser, and most of the 

 systematic names invented for the group, as Lamellirostres, Lamelloso-dentali, Serrati, 

 Dermorhynchi, etc. have been derived from the soft-skinned bill with the curious 

 lamellar teeth. Most of the species take their food under water, and, when the head 

 is raised, the water runs out between the lamella?, which act like a sieve in retaining 

 the food, which led to the invention of the English word 'sifters,' as an equivalent 

 of Lamellirostres. In some forms the lamella are shortened and thickened so as to 

 enable them to act as teeth in nipping off grass, as, for instance, in the geese, while in 

 the mergansers they are modified into retrorse hooks, which serve to prevent the slimy 

 fish from slipping away. Some of the more important anatomical characters have 

 been mentioned under the foregoing super-family, and others will be mentioned when 

 we describe the peculiarities of the flamingos. 



Ducks, and their allies, are found all over the globe. Man has found them where- 

 ever he went, and he has seen them flying northwards at the northernmost point he 

 has reached. 



The first form to meet us of the 'duck tribe,' in its widest sense, is one of those 

 remarkable extinct birds which formerly inhabited the islands of New Zealand, and 

 which lost their power of flight through disuse of that faculty, and consequent degen- 

 eration of the parts. Though originally described in connection with the Moa re- 

 mains, and found together with them, the Cnemiornis, as it was called by Owen, has 

 nothing to do with Dinornis, or the Struthious birds at all ; its ilia and ischia are united 

 behind, the sternum has trace of a keel, and the palate is desmognathous. It differs, 

 however, sufficiently from the typical Anseres to require the separate position of a 

 very marked family which we will call CNEMIORNITHID^E. 



