44 PASSERES. — CAPRIMULGID^. 



This I kept some days. It would sit anpvhere 

 that it was placed, across the finger, or across a 

 stick; never lengthivise, though I repeatedly tried 

 it so. Its position in sitting was quite perpen- 

 dicular, (that is, from head to tail,) the plumage 

 a little puffed out, the head drawn in, the eyes 

 usually shut. When pushed, however, it length- 

 ened the neck to retain its balance, and opened 

 its eyes, which being so large, and the irides of 

 a brilliant yellow, combined with the wide gape 

 to give it a most singular physiognomy. Usually 

 it seemed absolutely blind by day, for when the 

 eyes were wide open, the approach of any object 

 within a line of the pupil, and the moving of it 

 to and fro, produced, in general, not the slightest 

 effect. Once or twice, however, I observed that 

 when the pupil was greatly dilated, as it always 

 was when the lids were first unclosed, the sudden 

 motion of my hand towards the eye, caused the 

 pupil to contract with singular rapidity to less 

 than one fourth of its former dimensions. After- 

 wards by candle-light, I observed the extraordinary 

 rapidity and extent of this contractility more fully. 

 "When the candle was little more than a yard dis- 

 tant, the pupil was dilated to about jths of an 

 inch diameter, occupying the whole visible area 

 of the eye, the iris being reduced to an imper- 

 ceptible line ; on bringing the candle close to the 

 pupil, it contracted to a diameter of two lines, and 

 that completely within the period required to con- 

 vey the candle by the most rapid action of my hand 

 practicable. 



