WATER-FOWL. 



593 



sheathed with a skin which covers them all over. 

 The bill of every other bird seems, in some 

 measure, forced for piercing or tearing ; theirs 

 are only fitted for shovelling up their food, 

 which is chiefly of the vegetable kind. 



Though these birds do not reject animal 

 food when offered them, yet they can content- 

 edly subsist upon vegetables, and seldom seek 

 any other. They are easily provided for ; 

 wherever there is water, there seems to be 

 plenty. All the other web-footed tribes are 

 continually voracious, continually preying. 

 These lead more harmless lives : the weeds 

 on the surface of the water, or the insects at 

 the bottom, the grass by the bank, or the fruits 

 and corn in cultivated grounds, are sufficient 

 to satisfy their easy appetites : yet these, like 

 every other animal, will not reject flesh, if pro- 

 perly prepared for them; it is sufficient praise 

 to them that they do not eagerly pursue it. 



As their food is chiefly vegetables, so their 

 fecundity is in proportion. We have had fre- 

 quent opportunities to observe, that all the 

 predatory tribes, whether of birds or quadru- 

 peds, are barren and unfruitful. We have 

 seen the lion with its two cubs ; the eagle 

 with the same number ; and the penguin with 

 even but one. Nature, that has supplied them 

 with powers of destruction, has denied them 

 fertility. But it is otherwise with these harm- 

 less animals I am describing. They seem 

 formed to fill up the chasms in animated na- 

 ture, caused by the voraciousness of others. 

 They breed in great abundance, and lead 

 their young to the pool the instant they are 

 excluded. 



As their food is simple, so their flesh is 

 nourishing and wholesome. The swan was 



considered as a high delicacy among the an- 

 cients ; the goose was abstained from as total- 

 ly indigestible. Modern manners have in- 

 verted tastes ; the goose is now become the 

 favourite ; and the swan is seldom brought to 

 table, unless for the purposes of ostentation. 

 But at all times the flesh of the duck was in 

 high esteem ; the ancients thought even more 

 highly of it than we do. We are contented to 

 eat it is as a delicacy ; they also considered it 

 as a medicine ; and Plutarch assures us, that 

 Cato kept his whole family in health, by feed- 

 ing them with duck whenever they threatened 

 to be out of order. 



These qualities, of great fecundity, easy 

 sustenance, and wholesome nourishment, have 

 been found so considerable, as to induce man 

 to take these birds from a state of nature, and 

 render them domestic. How long they have 

 been thus dependents upon his pleasures is not 

 known ; for, from the earliest accounts, they 

 were considered as familiars about him. The 

 time must have been very remote; for there 

 have been many changes wrought in their 

 colours, their figures, and even their internal 

 parts, by human cultivation. The different 

 kinds of these birds, in a wild state, are simple 

 in their colourings : when one has seen a wild 

 goose or a wild duck, a description of its plu- 

 mage will, to a feather, exactly correspond 

 with that of any other. But in the tame kinds 

 no two of any species are exactly alike. Dif- 

 ferent in their size, their colours, and frequent- 

 ly in their general form, they seem the mere 

 creatures of art ; and having been so long de- 

 pendent upon man for support, they seem to 

 assume forms entirely suited to his pleasures 

 or necessities. 



CHAPTER CXXXI1. 



OF THE SWAN, TAME AND WILD. 



NO bird makes a more indifferent figure 

 upon land, or a more beautiful one in the 

 water, than die Swan. When it ascends from 

 its favourite element, its motions are awkward, 

 and its neck is stretched forward with an air 

 of stupidity ; but when it is seen smoothly 



sailing along the water, commanding a thou- 

 sand graceful attitudes, moving at pleasure 

 without the smallest effort ; " when it proudly 

 rows its state," as Milton has it, " with arch- 

 ed neck, between its white wings mantling," 

 there is not a more beautiful figure in all na- 



