300 



ANSERES. 



ANATID^. 



AMTID^E. 



Chenalopex ^gyptiaca (Linngeus*). 



THE EGYPTIAN GOOSE. 



Anser Egyptiacus. 



Chenalopex, Stephensf. — Bill as long as the head, slender, straight, the tij) 

 rounded, the margin laminated ; the upper mandible curved, its tip hooked ; the 

 lower flat. Nostrils basal. Wings rather long, broad, armed with a bare knob. 

 Tarsus stout, reticulated ; anterior toes rather long, connected by a web ; hind 

 toe free, elevated. Tail consisting of fourteen rounded feathers. 



Exceptions have been made — and, in the opiuion of the 

 Editor, most justly — to the admission of the Egyptian 

 Goose into the Catalogue of our British Birds, on the ground 

 that the specimens, though killed at large, or apparently in a 

 wild state, had probably escaped from the waters of parks or 

 pleasure grounds, where they had been bred and fostered on 

 account of the beauty of their plumage. In deciding to 



* Anas cegyptiaca, Linnseu.s, Syst. Nat. Ed. 12, i. p. 197 (1766). 

 + Shaw's Gen. Zool. xii. pt. ii. p. 41 (1824). 



