MENYANTHES MERGUS. 



not inexpressive of the appearance of this appendage. 

 Lyres, for that would be the best English name for them, 

 und it is also the French one, are peaceable and harm- 

 less birds, remaining quiet in the shade of the thick 

 branches and leaves during the day, so that they are 

 but seldom seen at that lime ; and nothing is known 

 with certainty of their nests, the numbers of their 

 broods, or even their time of breeding. The male 

 and female are usually found together, or at least not 

 far apart, when they come out in the mornings and 

 evenings to feed on the ground ; and they are appa- 

 rently very much attached to each other. They are 

 not often seen, except by those settlers who reside 

 very close on the forests in remote parts of the 

 colony ; for though their habit appears to be that of 

 feeding upon the ground only, yet they do not fre- 

 quent grounds on which there are no trees, the shade 

 of these appearing to be indispensable to them in the 

 heat of the day, as well as during the night. The 

 structure of the bill is decidedly insectivorous, or at 

 all events adapted for collecting worms, mollusca, 

 and other small ground animals ; and the claws are 

 adapted for scraping, though not so decidedly as those 

 of pouUry. In fact the birds, and the country 

 which they inhabit, are both so different from any- 

 thing else that we meet with, that they would require 

 to be both carefully examined, in order that any just 

 conclusion might be arrived at respecting the adapt- 

 ation of each to the other, or the use of the birds in 

 the general economy of nature. 



MENYANTHES (Linnaeus). An aquatic genus, 

 found in America and in Britain, where it is called 

 buck-bean. The genus belongs to the natural order 

 Gentumece. The different species require to be grown 

 in little pools or cisterns, and are propagated by 

 dividing the roots. 



MENZIESIA (Smith). A genus of North Ame- 

 rican and British undershrubs, belonging to the 

 Ericacece. These were associated with the heaths 

 by Linnaeus and others, until separated by Sir J. E. 

 Smith. 



MERCURY. This extraordinary metal differs 

 materially from the great bulk of mineral bodies in 

 being occasionally found flowing in a metallic state 

 through the earth. The greater part of the mercury 

 of commerce is, however, procured by distilling native 

 cinnabar, when the metal rises in vapour and is after- 

 wards condensed like steam. Mercury has a very 

 great specific gravity, being heavier than all other 

 fluids. It may be congealed when artificial freezing 

 mixtures are resorted to, and it may then be frac- 

 tured. The name quicksilver is given to tliis mineral, 

 on account of its fluid form and silvery aspect. 



MERGUS (Mergus). A genus of web-footed 

 birds, to which the name of goosander is given, at 

 least in some of the species. These names are by 

 no means applicable, because the birds have neither 

 the appearance nor the habits of geese of any de- 

 scription. Their characters are : the bill rather longer 

 than the middle size, and much more slender and 

 hard in its texture than the bills of ducks, not being a 

 dabbling or sentient bill like theirs, but a prehensile 

 bill of a very peculiar form. The mandibles are 

 straight for the greater part of their length, but the 

 upper one is much hooked at the point and verv 

 eharn, and the cutting edges of both mandibles are 

 in ail their length beset with short but strong and 

 sharp teeth inclining backwards. The bill is thus 

 fitted for taking an exceedingly firm hold of slippery 

 prey, and the birds use it in capturing' fish. The 



nostrils are placed about the middle of the length of 

 the bill, of an oval form and open. The legs are 

 short, placed far backwards as in the divers, and in 

 consequence of this, these birds are much more awk- 

 ward walkers than the ducks. The wings are of 

 moderate length, but they are clean and firmly made, 

 and the plumage of the body is also close and com- 

 pact, so that the power of flight is considerable, and 

 when necessary it can be extended to long distances 

 with comparatively little fatigue. As is the case with 

 the ducks, there is an enlargement of the pulmonic 

 end of the trachea, which no doubt answers the pur- 

 pose of a magazine of air, and enables the birds to 

 remain much longer under water than they could do 

 if not provided with such an apparatus. As the bill 

 of this genus of birds is not adapted for dabbling in 

 quest of soft prey in the mud like the bills of the 

 ducks, or for dividing vegetable matter like those of 

 the geese and swans, it has to find its food by ranging- 

 through the waters, and, generally speaking, by diving. 

 In this operation it is by no means so expert as the 

 divers properly so called, and therefore the bird is 

 provided with a more effective apparatus for securing 1 

 its prey in the hook of the upper mandible and the 

 teeth with which both mandibles are furnished. The 

 principal food of these birds is fish, in the capture of 

 which they are by no means inexpert, so that when 

 they make their inland excursions in temperate cli- 

 mates during the winter, they levy more severe con- 

 tributions on fish-ponds than any birds which resort 

 to such place?, not excepting even the herons, which, 

 though expert fishers and ravenous feeders, by not 

 being either swimmers or divers, are neccss-arily con- 

 fined to those portions of the water into which they 

 can wade. In addition to fish, the birds of this genus 

 live upon aquatic reptiles, such as frogs and water 

 newts. They are, in short, abundant rather than par- 

 ticular in their feeding, and hence their flesh is rank 

 and unsavoury, and rarely used as food even by those 

 northern tribes whose supply is the most scanty. 



All the genus, at least with some doubtful excep- 

 tions, are birds of the high latitudes of the north 

 that is, they summer, and nestle and rear their broods 

 there. They may also inhabit the high latitudes of 

 the southern hemisphere ; but we are very much in 

 the dark as to the economy of living nature in those 

 latitudes, so that we are unable to ascertain with any- 

 thing like precision, in what respects they agree with 

 or differ from the same latitudes of the northern hemi- 

 sphere. What lands, or whether any lands of con- 

 siderable extent may be within the southern polar 

 circle, is not discovered, and apparently not easily 

 discoverable. But if there are few or no lands clear 

 of ice in the southern summer, that is, in our winter, 

 it is perfectly clear that very few birds at all similar 

 to those which visit us from the extreme north in 

 winter, can resort to the regions of the South Pole to 

 breed. Of the birds which have been observed there, 

 to as high latitudes as there are resting places for 

 birds, the greater number, if not the whole, are either 

 long- winged birds which are discursive over the wide 

 ocean, or birds almost wingless, which never move 

 far from the same locality at any season of the 

 year. 



There are some other circumstances in the physical 

 geography of the southern hemisphere, which render 

 it necessary that we should not apply to that hemi- 

 sphere the knowledge which we possess of the aquatic 

 birds which are migrant in the north. In that hemi- 

 sphere the sea is open fairly round throughout th< 



