'M2 HISTORY OF 



appears that it lives and wades in the waters. It has a chirping 

 pert note, as we are told ; but with its other habits we aie en- 

 tirely unacquainted. I have placed it, from its slender figure, 

 among the cranes ; although it is web-footed, like the duck. It 

 is one of those birds of whose history we are yet in expecta- 

 tion.* 



To this bird of the crane kind, so little known, I will add an- 

 other, still less known ; the Corrira, or Runner, of Aldrovan- 

 dus. All we are told of it is, that it has the longest legs of all 

 web-footed fowls, except the flamingo and avosetta ; that the bill 

 is straight, yellow, and black at the ends ; that the pupils of the 

 eyes are surrounded with two circles, one of which is bay, and 

 the other white : below, near the belly, it is whitish ; the tail, 

 with two white feathers, black at the extremities : and that the 

 upper part of the body is of the colour of rusty iron. It is thus 

 that we are obliged to substitute dry description for instructive 

 history ; and employ words to express those shadings of colour 

 >sbich the pencil alone can convey. 



CHAP. X. 



SMALL BIRDS OF THE CRANE KIND, WITH THE THIGHS PARTLY 

 BARE OF FEATHERS. 



As I have taken my distinctions rather from the general form 

 and manners of birds, than from their minuter though perhaps 

 more precise discriminations, it will not be expected that I 



* The Avosets of Europe and America prefer cold and temperate climates 

 to hot countries. ITieir migrations are determined by the want or abun. 

 dance of food. In winter they assemble in small flocks of six or seven, and 

 frequent our shores, especially the mouths of large muddy rivers, in search 

 of worms and marine insects. These they scoop out of the mud with their 

 recurved bills, which are admirably adapted for that purpose, being tough 

 and flexible like whalebone. The feet seem calculated for swimming, but 

 tliey are never observed to take the water : it is therefore probable, that 

 they are furnished witli a web merely to prevent their sinking into the mud. 

 The female lays two eggs, about the size of those of a pigeon, of a white 

 colour tinged with green, and marked with large black spots. It is said to 

 be very tenacious of its yotuig, and when disturbed at tliis season, will fly 

 round in repented circles, uttering a note that resembles the word twit-twU, 



