196 HABITS OP BIRDS. 



The learned author of the * Physicae Curiosae/ 

 however, could not find any such passage as 

 this in Pliny, and we also have searched for it 

 in vain. Bartholomaeus goes on to say that " Master 

 Jacobus de Vitriaco, in his book on the Wonders 

 of the Eastern World, telleth another cause of the 

 death of the pelican's birds. He saith, that in 

 Egypt is a bird hight [named] Pelly canus, a 

 bird with great wings and most lean ; for all that 

 he swalloweth passeth forth anon behind : for he 

 hath a right flipper gut. And, therefore, he may not 

 hold meat till it be incorporate. And the serpent 

 hateth kindly [sincerely] this bird. Wherefore when 

 the mother passeth out of the nest to get meat, the 

 serpent climbeth on the tree and stingeth or infecteth 

 the birds. And when the mother cometh again, she 

 maketh sorrow three days for her birds, as it is said. 

 Then (he saith) she smiteth herself in the breast and 

 springeth blood upon them and reareth them fro death 

 to life, and then for greater bleeding the mother 

 waxeth {eeble and the birds been compelled to pass 

 out of the nest to get themselves meat. And some 

 of them for kind love feed the mother that is feeble, 

 and some been unkind and care not for the mother, 

 and the mother taketh good heed thereto, and when 

 she cometh to her strength, she nourisheth and 

 loveth those birds that fed her in her need, and put- 

 teth away her other birds as unworthy and unkind, 

 and suffereth them not to dwell or live with her*." 



The origin of the fable is plausibly explained by 

 M. Perranet, who says " there is nothing in the struc- 

 ture of the pelican but enters into the general plan 

 of the organization of birds ; all of them have a 

 craw in which their food is lodged ; in the pelican 

 it lies without and under the bill, instead of being 

 concealed within, and placed at the bottom of the 

 oesophagus. But this exterior craw has not the 

 * Berthlet, Barthol. de Prop. Rer. fol. Lond. 1498. 



