568 



4 HISTORY OF 



CHAPTER CXXI. 



OF SMALL BIRDS OF THE CRANE KIND, WITH THE THIGHS PARTLY BARE 



OF FEATHERS. 



AS I have taken my distinctions rather 

 from the general form and manners of birds, 

 than from their minuter though perhaps more 

 precise discriminations, it will not be expected 

 that I should here enter into a particular his- 

 tory of a numerous tribe of birds, whose man- 

 ners and forms are so very much alike. Of 

 many of them we have scarcely any account 

 in our historians, but tedious descriptions of 

 their dimensions, and the colour of their plu- 

 mage ; and of the rest, the history of one is so 

 much that of all, that it is but the same ac- 

 count repeated to a most disgusting reiteration. 

 I will therefore group them into one general 

 draught ; in which the more eminent, or the 

 most whimsical, will naturally stand forward 

 on the canvass. 



In this group we find an extensive tribe 

 of native birds, with their varieties and 

 affinities; and we might add a hundred others, 

 of distant climates, of which we know little 

 more than the colour and the name. In this 

 list is exhibited the Curlew, a bird of about 

 the size of a duck, with a bill four inches 

 long: the Woodcock, about the size of a 

 pigeon, with a bill three inches long : the 

 Godwit, of the same size; the bill four inches: 

 the Green Shank, longer legged ; the bill two 

 inches and a half: the Red Shank, differing 

 in the colour of its feet from the former: the 

 Snipe, less by half, with a bill three inches. 

 Then with shorter bills The Ruff, with a 

 collar of feathers round the neck of the male: 

 the Knot, the Sandpiper, the Sanderling, the 

 Dunlin, the Purre, and the Stint. To con- 

 clude with bills very short The Lapwing, 

 the Green Plover, the Gray Plover, the Dot- 

 trel, the Turnstone, and the Sea-lark. These, 

 with their affinities, are properly natives or 

 visitants of this country; and are dispersed 

 along our shores, rivers, and watery grounds. 

 Taking in the birds of this kind, belonging 

 to other countries, the list would be very 



widely extended ; and the whole of this class, 

 as described by Brisson, would amount to 

 near a hundred. 



All these birds possess many marks in 

 common; though some have peculiarities 

 that deserve regard. All these birds are 

 bare of feathers above the knee, or above 

 the heel, as some naturalists choose to express 

 it. In fact, that part which I call the knee, 

 if compared with the legs of mankind, is 

 analogous to the heel ; but, as it is-common- 

 ly conceived otherwise, I have conformed to 

 the general apprehension. I say, therefore, 

 that all these birds are bare of feathers 

 above the knee; and in some they are want- 

 ing half way up the thigh. The nudity in 

 that part, is partly natural, and partly pro- 

 duced by all birds of this kind habitually 

 wading in water. The older the bird, the 

 barer are its thighs ; yet even the young ones 

 have not the same downy covering reaching 

 so low as the birds of any other class. Such 

 a covering there would rather be prejudicial, 

 as being continually liable to get wet in the 

 water. 



As these birds are usually employed rather 

 in running than in flying, and as their food 

 lies entirely upon the ground, and not on 

 trees or in the air, so they run with great 

 swiftness for their size, and the length of their 

 legs assists their velocity. But, as in seek- 

 ing their food, they are often obliged to 

 I change their station ; so also are they equally 

 swift of wing, and traverse immense tracts of 

 country without much fatigue. 



It has been thought by some, that a part of 

 this class lived upon an oily slime, found in 

 the bottoms of ditches and of weedy pools ; 

 they were thence termed, by Willoughby, 

 Mudsuckers. But laterdiscoveries have shown 

 that, in these places, they hunt for the cater- 

 pillars and worms of insects. From hence, 

 therefore, we may generally assert, that all 



