CHAPTER XV. 



FLAMINGOES, DUCKS, AND SCREAMERS, 

 Orders ODONTOGLOSSI, ANSERP:S, AND PALAMEDE^E. 



TAKING the general term " ducks " as including the geese, swans, etc., the members 

 of the three groups above named will comprise the remaining orders of birds 

 with bridged (desmognathous) palates, all of which are broadly distinguished from 

 those hitherto described by the circumstance that their young are covered with 

 down when hatched, and are able to run within a few hours of their first appear- 

 ance in the world. The members of these three orders are accordingly the only 

 birds which have bridged palates, and "precocious" young. In regard to the 

 flamingoes, it has only been recently ascertained that the young are hatched in 

 this forward condition. In the collective group the three front toes are either 

 completely webbed, or united by a fold of skin ; and in most cases the beak is 

 either depressed and expanded, or has its extremity so bent down as to be at right 

 angles to its base, while its angle is produced in a recurved process behind the 

 points of articulation with the skull. Generally the rostrum of the base of the 

 skull has oval basipterygoid facets placed relatively far forwards; and in all 

 cases the oil-gland is tufted. Many of the group are more or less completely 

 herbivorous. 



THE FLAMINGOES. 

 Order ODONTOGLOSSI, Family PHCENICOPTERID^E. 



With an apparently intuitive perception of its zoological relationship, the 

 Persians apply the name of kaj-i-surkh (red goose) to the flamingo, and have 

 thus forestalled the ornithologist, by whom these birds were always associated 

 with the storks and herons, as indeed they still are by some. Possessing the above- 

 mentioned features in common with the other two groups treated in this chapter, 

 the flamingoes, if we had only existing forms to deal with, might be readily 

 distinguished by the peculiar form of their beaks ; but it happens that there are 

 certain nearly allied extinct birds in which the beak appears to have been of a 

 more normal form ; and we are accordingly compelled to rely largely on other 

 features in defining the order. The whole group is readily characterised 

 by the great length of the legs, in which the tibia may be not greatly 

 longer than the metatarsus, while the first toe is rudimentary, or even 

 wanting. The lower end of the tibia differs widely from that of the duck 

 tribe in that its lower end is not bent inwards ; while the corresponding 

 extremity of the metatarsus is very similar to that of the storks, having 



