SWANS. 143 



are found in South Africa, Madagascar, India, and Australia. Notwithstanding their 

 size, which is not greater than that of a teal, they are true geese with a typical bernicle bill. 

 They are excellent swimmers, however, and pass the greater part of their life on the 

 water, thus differing from most other geese. The Indian species (JV. coromandelicus), 

 is described as having a peculiar shuffling gait when on land, as " after walking a few 

 steps they always squat." Jerdon thinks it probable that in the wild state they never 

 alight on the land. 



The swans are distinguished by the extraordinary elongation of the neck, which is 

 affected by the great number of cervical vertebrae, and not by their being unusually 

 lengthened, as is the case with most other long-necked birds. There are no occipital 

 foramina as in most other ducks, and the pelvis is considerably lengthened and rather 

 narrowed in the postacetabular region. The feet are placed far back, indicating that 

 the swans are more at home on the water than on the land, as is also evident from the 

 shortness of the tarsus. The base of the bill, which is anatine in its form, and the 

 loral region are naked in the adults. The swans are highly ornamental on ponds and 

 lakes, and several of the species are kept in semi-domestication for that purpose, 

 especially those with a gracefully curved neck. They inhabit the temperate regions 

 both north and south of the equator, one genus with one species being peculiar to 

 Australia, one to South America ; one genus is circumpolar, and the fourth is Palaearc- 

 tic ; Africa alone has no swans at the present day, This group is apparently nearer 

 related to the ducks proper than to the geese, but from the caverns of Malta is known 

 a gigantic fossil form, Palceocygnus falconeri, which, on account of its high, stout, and 

 short-toed feet, seems to take an intermediate position between geese and swans. 



The discovery of Australia altered many an Old World notion in regard to ani- 

 mals and plants, and the saying " white as a swan " had to be modified when the Aus- 

 tralian black swan (Chenopis atrata) was discovered towards the end of the last 

 century. It is a most beautiful species ; the neck is very long and thin, its curvature 

 very graceful, and the inner wing-feathers are curled and raised ; the color is entirely 

 dull black, with white on the wing; the eye is red, and the bill vivid carmine, 

 adorned with a white cross-band. It is entirely acclimatized in the northern hemi- 

 sphere. The white swans of the genus Olor, of which two species are peculiar to the 

 Palaearctic region and two to this continent, do not carry their neck in an S-like curve 

 as do the other forms, but straight, more after the fashion of the geese. They have a 

 loud and sonorous voice, the resonant quality of which is due to the convolutions of the 

 windpipe within the breast-bone, similar to the arrangement already described in some 

 cranes. The trumpeters or whistling-swans breed chiefly in the Arctic regions, mi- 

 grating southwards in winter. Somewhat similar in appearance, on account of the 

 dazzlingly white plumage, but differing in having a most elegantly S-like neck, a high 

 frontal knob, wedge-shaped tail, and simple windpipe, is the European so-called tame 

 or mute-swan (Cygnus gibbus), the habitat of which seems to be the western temper- 

 ate portion of the Palaaarctic region. When this snow-white bird with the scarlet bill 

 is leisurely swimming, the wing-feathers half raised like sails, and the neck doubly 

 curved, it certainly is one of the most majestic and beautiful members of the feathered 

 tribes. Among water birds it has no rival on the northern half of the globe, and it 

 is very doubtful if it does not even excel the South American black-necked swan 

 (Sthenelides melanc&rypha), the exquisite grace of which is beyond description. The 

 plumage of the last-mentioned species is of the purest white, except on the head and 

 neck, which are of a velvety seal-brown of the darkest shade, in the most strikino- con- 



