WATERFOWL 



wandering albatross to soar for days together 

 over the illimitable ocean. With one notice- 

 able exception, these waterfowl exhibit a 

 more extraordinary range of size and weight 

 than any other family of birds, from the 

 whooper swan, five feet long and twenty -five 

 pounds on the scales, down to the little teal, 

 with an overall measurement of only fourteen 

 niches and a weight that does not exceed as 

 many ounces. The only other family of birds 

 running to such extremes is that of the birds 

 of prey, which include at once the stately 

 condor of the Andes with its whig-spread of 

 fifteen feet, and the miniature red-legged 

 falconet of India and adjoining countries, 

 in which the same measurement would 

 scarcely reach as many niches. 



Since even game birds are derisively re- 

 ferred to as " tame " only by those ignorant of 

 the facts, the birds now under notice differ in 

 this respect from all those previously dealt 

 with ; and they are geographically apart, 

 again, from our other domesticated animals, 

 since they are not, like the barndoor fowl 

 and most of the rest, of Asiatic origin, but 

 must often, in the grey of a winter morning, 

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