JACKASS 



465 



di'aughtsmen of the country last named making it a favourite 

 subject of their pictures, in which its flowing tail and the very 

 peculiar filamentous appendages to the tip of its first and fourth 

 primaries are generally faithfully represented. In habits the 

 Jacanas have much in common with the Water-hens, but that fact 

 is insufficient to warrant the affinity asserted to exist between the 

 two groups ; for in their osteological structure, as already implied, 

 there is much difference, and the resemblance seems to be only that 

 of analogy. The Foirridx, or at least such of them as have been 

 sufficiently observed, lay very peculiar eggs, of a rich olive-brown 



T£H>VI)ltT-t i: 



Indian Jacana, Hydrophasianus cMriirgns. 



colour, in most cases closely marked with dark lines, thus presenting 

 an appearance by which they may be readily known from those of 

 any other birds, though an approach to it is occasionally to be 

 noticed in those of certain Limkolse, and especially of certain 

 Charadriidx. The genus Palamedea (Screamer) was at one time 

 thought to be allied to this Family, but is now, by almost common 

 consent, allowed to have nothing to do with it. 



JACKASS, two species of Penguin (resembling one another 

 so nearly as to have been long confounded) Spheniscus demersus and 

 S. rtuigellanicus, so called by sailors and by the people of the c/,i(^cA^^^^^ 

 Falkland Islands ^ — the latter " from its habit, while on shore, of 

 throwing its head backwards, and making a loud strange noise, very 

 like the braying of an ass." (Darwin, Journal of Researches, chap, ix.) 

 With the prefix " Laughing," the name is commonly applied to a 

 large Australian Kingfisher, Dacelo gigas, Avhich makes, says Caley 



^ An older name there was Jumpnig Jack (Clayton, Phil. Trans. Ixvi. p, 103). 



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