329 



CHAPTER XV. 



Latirostral Flat- beaked. Boat-bill. Spoonbill. Flamingo 

 Mode of Feeding Nests of Watchful Habits. Tenuiros- 

 tral, or Longirostral. Long, Slender-billed Birds. Avoset. 

 Sand- Pipers. Dotterel Preservation of its Young. Dunlin's 

 Nest and Eggs Plover Mode of Catching. Ibis Mum- 

 mies of Why held Sacred. 



TABLE XXIY. (See page 20.) 



OEDEE 5. WADEES. TEIBE 3. LATIEOSTEES 

 (Flat-beaJced). 



rFHE three genera of this Table have been included by 

 -*- some naturalists amongst the cultirostral, or cutting- 

 beaked birds ; but the general form of their beaks renders 

 them easily distinguishable under the term latirostral, or flat- 

 beaked. The Spoon-bills, indeed, alone really deserve that 

 title to the fullest extent ; for the beaks of the Boat-bills and 

 Flamingoes, though to a certain degree wide and flattened, 

 have also a considerable degree of depth. 



The Cancroma, or Boat-bill, so called from the boat- 

 formed shape of its beak, resembles the Heron in almost 

 every other particular, and, 

 like that bird, will dart with 

 fury at the object of its 

 anger. It is found in the 

 hot and damp parts of 

 South America, frequenting 

 the banks of fresh- water 

 streams. 



The Spoon-bill cannot be Head of the Boat-bill. 



mistaken, the round and flattened termination of its beak at 

 once pointing out the name. Sometimes, but rarely, they 



