ILLUSTRATIONS 



NOTE 22. 



The rev. dr. Miller, in his excellent work, entitled A. Retrospect of the High 

 teenth Century, states, that there are two thousand five hundred and thirty-six 

 species of birds. Latham in the first six volumes of his Synopsis of Birds, has 

 described ninety-six genera, and two thousand and forty six species. The ad- 

 ditions made in his subsequent volumes have increased the number of species to 

 three thousand. 



The number of birds treated by Linnaeus did not greatly exceed nine hundred. 



There are in Great Britain three hundred and seven species of birds, compre- 

 hending all such a*s either visit that island at uncertain seasons, or are usually 

 domesticated, as well as those which are known to be constant inhabitants, of 

 which one hundred and fifty-four are land birds, and one hundred and fifty-three 

 water birds. 



I think it is not unreasonable to suppose that there are, in the United States 

 and its territories, one thousand species of bird*. 



NOTE 23. 



I believe it may be laid down as a general rule that all birds of the anas genus 

 may be domesticated. That beautiful bird, the summer or wood duck, (anas 

 sponsa,) and the black duck, (anas obscura, or nigra,) I have seen in a state of 

 domestication. Mr. Cornelius Bergen, of King's county, about the latter end of 

 April, put fifteen eggs of the black duck, on which the old one was sitting, under 

 a dunghill hen j the next day twelve young were hatched, of which he raised 

 eleven ; one of them flew away in August, and returned in November, with 

 a strange male, which was taken and tamed. It mixes readily with the common 

 duck, and their offspring are productive. It lays a great many eggs, and has two 

 broods in a year. Latham says, that the american wigeon, (anas americana,) 

 or pheasant duck, as it is called at New- York, has been domesticated j its flesh 

 is most excel lent. 



Lewis and Clarke saw, on the Missouri, a small species of goose differing con- 

 siderably from the Canadian goose, and beautiful white brants, which, no doubt, 

 might be domesticated. 



Scudder has, in his museum, two specimens of non-descript geese, shot on Long 

 Island, and never seen before. One ho call? the brant goose, and supposes it to 



