208 History of Nat are. [BooK X. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



Of the Grus, 1 Ciconiaf Olorf some foreign Birds, and the 

 Coturnix and Glottis. 



THE Nation of the Pigmies enjoys a Truce when (as we 

 have said before) the Cranes, who wage War with them, de- 

 part into other Countries. And if a Man consider from how 

 far they come, from the Levant Sea, it is an immense Extent. 

 When they set forward it is by general Consent. They fly high, 

 to have a good look out ; and they choose a Leader, whom 

 they follow. In the extremity of their Host there are some 

 disposed which utter Cries, and keep the Flock in orderly 

 Arrangement with their Voice ; and this they do by turns. 

 They maintain a Watch all the Night long, and the Sentinels 

 hold a little Stone* in their Foot, which by falling from it, if 

 they sleep, reproves them for their Negligence. All the rest 

 sleep, couching their Heads under their Wings; and they 

 stand sometimes upon one Foot, and sometimes on the other. 

 The Leader beareth his Neck aloft in the Air as he looks 

 forward, and giveth his Word what is to be done. These 



1 Ardea grus, LINN. The Crane. For their hostility to the Pigmies, 

 see B. iv. Ch. xi. Wern. Club. 



2 Ardea ciconia, LINN. The Stork. Wern. Club. 



3 Anas olor, and A. cygnus, LINN. The wild and tame Swan. 



The lamentable singing referred to by the author is often alluded to 

 by ancient writers ; but nothing of the sort has been witnessed by modern 

 observers. Wern. Club. 



4 " The old grammarian, Johannes Tzetzer. has rendered this story 

 into Greek verse; and the historian Ammianus Marcellinus tells us, 

 that in imitation of the ingenuity of the Crane to insure vigilance, Alex- 

 ander the Great was accustomed to rest with a silver ball in his hand, 

 suspended over a b'rass basin, which, if he began to sleep, might fall and 

 awake him." " Habits of Birds," in Library of Entertaining Knowledge. 

 Wern. Club. 



