126 THE PELICAN OF FACT. 



approaches, tliey separate into pairs, and retire to the 

 savage hills and the unfrequented recesses of the dreary 

 moorlands : — 



"Eemote from human sight, 

 In lonely pairs their vernal flight 

 They speed o'er heathy mountain rude, 

 Or some waste marsh's solitude, 

 To the tall grass or bristling reed 

 Their wild unnestled young to breed." 



Fable and poetry have done their best to immortalize 

 the Pelican, which has long been a favourite emblem of 

 maternal devotion. The distinctive characteristic of this 

 well-known bird is the bright yellow^ membranous pouch 

 attached to the lower mandible of the long and powerful 

 bill. This pouch will hold a considerable number of fish, 

 and thus enables the bird to store up any superfluous 

 quantity which may be taken during fishing excursions, 

 either for her own consumption or for the sustenance of 

 her young. In feeding the nestlings, — and the male, it is 

 said, supplies the wants of the female, when she is sitting, 

 in the same manner, — the upper mandible is pressed against 

 the neck and breast, in such wise as to assist the bird in 

 emptying the capacious pouch ; and during this action the 

 reel nib of the upper mandible seems to come in contact 

 with the breast. In this way, w^e may surmise, originated 

 the fable that the pelican nourishes her young with her 

 blood, and the attitude in which the imagination of painters 

 has placed the bird in the Emblem Books, with the blood 

 issuing from the wounds made by the terminating nail of 

 the upper mandible. 



Bishop Epiphanius, at a very early date, recorded the 



