182 A HISTORY OF 



CHAPTER X 



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

 OF FEATHERS. 



AS I have taken my distinctions rather from the general form and 

 manners of birds, than from their minuter, though perhaps more pre- 

 cise, discriminations, it will not be expected that I should here enter 

 into a particular history of a numerous tribe of birds, whose manners 

 and forms are so very much alike. Of many of them we have scarce 

 any account in our historians, but tedious descriptions of their dimen- 

 sions, and the colour of their plumage ; and of the rest the history 

 of one is so much that of all, that it is but the same account repeated 

 to a most disgusting reiteration. I will therefore groupe them into 

 one general draught, in which the more eminent, or the most whimsi- 

 cal, 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 Sander- 

 ling, the Dunlin, the Purre, and the Stint. To conclude : with bills 

 very short The Lapwing, the Green Plover, the Gray Plover, the 

 Dottrel, 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 posesses 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 ex- 

 press 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 commonly 

 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 wanting half way up the thigh. The 

 nudity in that part is partly natural, and partly produced by all bird? 

 of this kind habitually wading in water. The older the bird, the 

 barer are its thighs ; yet even the young ones have not the sam* 



