260 HIMAKTOPUS. 



In the last week of last month, five of those most rare 

 birds, too uncommon to have obtained an English name, but 

 known to naturalists by the terms of himantopus, or loripes, 

 and cJiaradrius liimantopus were shot upon the verge of 

 Frinsham Pond, a large lake belonging to the Bishop of 

 "Winchester, and lying between "Wolmer Sorest and the town 

 of Farnham, in the county of Surrey. The pond-keeper says 

 there were three brace in the flock ; but that, after he had 

 satisfied his curiosity, he suffered the sixth to remain unmo- 

 lested. One of these specimens I procured, and found the 

 length of the legs to be so extraordinary, that, at first sight, 

 one might have supposed the shanks had been fastened on 

 to impose on the credulity of the beholder : they were legs 

 in caricatura ; and had we seen such proportions on a Chi- 

 nese or Japan screen, we should have made large allowances 

 for the fancy of the draughtsman. These birds are of the 

 plover family, and might, with propriety, be called the stilt- 

 plovers.* Brisson, under that idea, gives them the apposite 

 name of Vechasse. My specimen, when drawn, and stuffed 

 with pepper, weighed only four ounces and a quarter, though 

 the naked part of the thigh measured three inches and a half, 

 and the legs four inches and a half. Hence we may safely 

 assert, that these birds exhibit, weight for inches, incompar- 

 ably the greatest length of legs of any known bird. The 

 flamingo, for instance, is one of the most long-legged birds, 

 and yet it bears no manner of proportion to the himantopus; 

 for a cock flamingo weighs, at an average, about four pounds 

 avoirdupois ; and his legs and thighs measure usually about 

 twenty inches. But four pounds are fifteen times and a 

 fraction more than four ounces and a quarter ; and if four 

 ounces and a quarter have eight inches of legs, four pounds 

 must have one hundred and twenty inches and a fraction of 

 legs, viz. somewhat more than ten feet, such a monstrous 

 proportion as the world never saw ! If you should try the 

 experiment in still larger birds, the disparity would still 

 increase. It must be matter of great curiosity to see the 

 stilt-plover move ; to observe how it can wield such a length 

 of lever with such feeble muscles as the thighs seem to be 



* The stilted plover is a very rare bird in this country, and its appearance 

 is now allowed to be quite accidental. ED. 



