74 FACULTIES OF BIRDS. 



This opinion is rendered more probable from the 

 very different structure of the nostrils in birds which 

 feed on live fish. The pelicans, for example, have 

 the cavity of the nostrils in general very small, and 

 the marginal cartilage, as well as the opening in 

 the bone, scarcely perceptible, even in the skeleton. 

 The cormorant (Carbo cormoranus, MEYER), again, 

 which is ranked in the same group (PehcanidcF^ 

 LEACH), has the nostrils so small that De Blainville 

 says it is with difficulty a very small slit can be dis- 

 tinguished at the base of the bill in the living birds, 

 hence he designates them by the term Crypt or hi?iia. 

 The same author describes in several species a sort of 

 scale covering the nostrils like a lid*, which must, 

 we should imagine, diminish their power of smell by 

 admitting only a minute portion of the air containing 

 odoriferous particles. It is worthy of remark, that 

 the kingfisher (Alcedo), though not a swimming 

 bird like the pelicans and cormorants, has very 

 small nostrils, with a cartilaginous lidf; smell being, 

 so far as we can judge, of inferior moment to them, 

 inasmuch as they feed almost exclusively on live fish J, 

 which they must discover and pursue by the eye. 



In ducks (AnatidcB^ LEACH), many of whom seek 

 their food amongst the mud at the bottom of standing 

 water, the nerves of smell are greatly expanded, 

 a fact which has been long known. " Flat-billed 

 birds/' says Mr. Clayton, " that grope for their meat, 

 have three pair of nerves that come into their bills, 

 whereby they have that accuracy to distinguish what 

 is proper for food and what to be rejected, by their 

 taste, when they do not see it. This was most evident 

 in a duck's bill and head ; ducks having larger nerves 

 that come into their bills than geese or any other bird 

 that I have seen ; and therefore quaffer arid grope 



* Principes d'Anat. Comp. 323-4. f Ibid. 319, 



\ See Paxton in Ho'rt. Regist. Jan. 1832. 



