PALMIPEDES. 171 



that renders their feet complete oars, notwithstanding which, they 

 perch upon trees, being almost the only Palmipedes who do so. 

 They all fly well and have short feet. Linnasus separated them into 

 three genera, the first of which it was necessary to subdivide. 



PELECANTJS, Lin. 



The Pelicans comprise all those in which the base of the bill is found to have 

 some part destitute of feathers. Their nostrils are fissures, the apertures 

 of which are scarcely perceptible. The skin of their throat is more or less 

 extensible, and their tongue very small. Their thin gizzard, with their 

 other stomachs, forms a large sac. 



The bill of the True Pelicans is very remarkable for its extreme length, 

 its straight, very broad and horizontally flattened form, for the hook which 

 terminates it, and for the lower mandible whose flexible branches sustain a 

 naked membrane, susceptible of being dilated into a large sac. 



P. onocrotalus, L. (The Common Pelican.) As large as a Swan, en- 

 tirely white, slightly tinged with flesh colour; the hook of the bill of a 

 cherry-red; is more or less disseminated throughout the eastern continent, 

 breeds in marshes, and feeds exclusively on living Fish. It is said to trans- 

 port both food and water in its sac. 



PHALACROCOHAX, Briss. 



The Cormorants(\) have an elongated and compressed beak, the end of 

 the upper mandible hooketi, and that of the lower one truncated; the tongue 

 is very small, and the skin of the throat less dilatable; the nostrils resemble 

 a small unpierced line, and the nail of the middle toe is notched like a saw. 



Pel. carbo, L. (The Cormorant.) Black-brown, undulated with jet black 

 on the back, and mixed with white near the end of the bill and front of the 

 neck; circumference of the throat and the cheeks, white, in the male, which 

 also has a tuft on the occiput. Its size is that of the Goose. It breeds in 

 holes among the rocks or upon trees, and lays three or four eggs. 



TACHYPETES, Vieill. 



The Frigate Birds differ from the Cormorants in their forked tail and short 

 feet, the membranes of which are deeply emarginated; in an excessive length 

 of wing, and in a bill both of whose mandibles are curved at the point. So 

 powerful are their wings, that they fly to an immense distance from all land, 

 principally between the tropics, darting upon the Flying Fish and striking 

 the Boobies to make them disgorge their prey. 



One species only is well known, the Pelecanus aquilus, L., whose plumage 



(1) Cormorant from Cormoran, a corruption of Corbeau marin, on account 

 of its black colour. It is in fact the Aquatic Crow of Aristotle. Phalacro- 

 corax (Said Crow] is the Greek name of this bird, indicated by Pliny, but 

 is not employed by Aristotle. 



