closed shed, which was secured against their enemies at 

 sunset. 



The swan on the other hand is a very powerful bird, and 

 is master of the situation, it is generally either floating on 

 the water or at any rate very close to the edge, in its own 

 element it would be more than a match for a fox or perhaps 

 even a wolf, and as it needs no protection from man it is not 

 provided with any by him. 



The whiteness of the swan puzzled me for years, but by 

 the aid of a theory propounded by Professor Meldola, I was 

 enabled to see my way out of the difficulty. 



The swan is lord of the lake, seeks no concealment, and 

 can therefore exist, although as conspicuous a bird as can be 

 imagined ; the advantage of the white color to the swan is 

 this, that as it lives in cold wet places, often for many hours 

 on the water, at all seasons of the year, the white color is 

 precisely that which radiates the heat least, and, combined 

 with the thick down under the feathers, retains in the most 

 admirable manner, as much as possible, the natural heat of 

 the living bird. 



There is one curious point about the color of the swan, 

 although it looks white, it is not an albino, but on the con- 

 trary an albino of the common swan is known to naturalists 

 as Cygnus olor immutabilis, the legs of these birds are not so 

 dark as those of the type, and the young are white from birth. 



All the wild species of swan on this side of the equator 

 are pure white, and they inhabit both the Nearctic and 

 Palearctic regions, but the tame species is the only one in 

 which the migratory instinct, if existent, could be eliminated, 

 all the others are purely migratory birds, Bewick's swan 

 breeding only within the arctic circle. 



The old birds drive their young away when the latter are 

 full grown, and even where several live on the same lake, 

 each pair jealously ejects all intruders from its territory. 



The greatest number of swans I ever saw together was 

 on the Alstu Dam at Hamburgh. 



It is instructive to notice that all the swans from the 



