THE SWIFT-FOOT. 103 



what harsh; but the young birds and the eggs are much 

 sought after as food, in the islands far to the north, the 

 Faroe islands especially, where sea-birds are very numerous, 

 and form no inconsiderable part of the food of the people. 



SWIFT-FOOT (Cursorius). 



The cream-coloured swift-foot, Cursorius Isabellinus (Afri- 

 zanus would be a more appropriate trivial name, as indi- 

 cating its native habitat), is one of the rarest stragglers, not 

 only in Britain, but throughout Europe. Five specimens 

 only are recorded as having been seen, three of which were 

 in England, but wide apart both in space and in time, one in 

 France, and one in Austria. 



The native regions of the bird border upon those of the 

 ostrich, though it partakes more of the characters of the 

 plovers than of those of the ostrich or even of the bustards. 

 The wide and wild plains of north-western Africa, which are 

 in part flooded by the rains, or the melting of the snow on 

 the mountains of Atlas, are supposed to be its nesting-places 

 and its usual haunts : but very little is known of its habits, 

 farther than that it runs with great celerity, and picks up its 

 food on the ground. 



Its legs are long, and naked to a considerable height above 

 the joints of the tarsi ; the toes are short, all three turned 

 forward, and the inner and middle ones united by a mem- 

 brane at their bases. The structure of the foot indicates a 

 walker on the bare earth, and not on grass, and the junction 

 of the middle and inner toe would lead to the conclusion 

 that the surface on which it walks is occasionally soft with 

 humidity or loose sand. These birds are equally swift on 

 foot and on the wing. The form of the bill, which is short, 

 or of moderate length, and bent, is fitted for pecking on the 

 ground, and the tomia are fitted for bruising ; but whether 

 they bruise the elytra of beetles, the shells of mollusca, or the 



