278 OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS. 



backwards almost as the edge of a knife, ihat in striking they may 

 easily cut the water; while the feet are palmated, and broad for 

 swimming, yet so folded up when advanced forward to take a fresh 

 stroke, as to be full as narrow as the shank. The two exterior toes of 

 the feet are longest ; the nails flat and broad, resembling the human, 

 which give strength, and increase the power of swimming. The foot, 

 when expanded, is not at right angles to the leg or body of the bird : 

 but the exterior part inclining towards the head, forms an acute angle 

 with the body ; the intention being not to give motion in the line of the 

 legs themselves, but by the combined impulse of both in an inter- 

 mediate line, the line of the body. 



Most people know, that have observed at all, that the swimming of 

 birds is nothing more than a walking in the water, where one foot 

 succeeds the other as on the land ; yet no one, as far as I am aware, 

 has remarked that diving fowls, while under water, impel and row 

 themselves forward by a motion of their wings, as well as by the 

 impulse of their feet : but such is really the case, as any person may 

 easily be convinced, who will observe ducks when hunted by dogs in a 

 clear pond. Nor do I know that any one has given a reason why the 

 wings of diving fowls are placed so forward : doubtless, not for 

 the purpose of promoting their speed in flying, since that position 

 certainly impedes it; but probably for the increase of their motion 

 under water, by the use of four oars instead of two ; yet were the wings 

 and feet nearer together, as in land-birds, they would, when in action, 

 rather hinder than assist one another. 



This colymbus was of considerable bulk, weighing only three 

 drachms short of three pounds avoirdupois. It measured in length 

 from the bill to the tail (which was very short) two feet, and to the 

 extremities of the toes four inches more; and the breadth of the 

 wings expanded was forty-two inches. A person attempted to eat the 

 body, but found it very strong and rancid, as is the flesh of all birds 

 living on fish. Divers or loons, though bred in the most northerly 

 parts of Europe, yet are seen with us in very severe winters; and on 

 the Thames they are called sprat loons, because they prey much on that 

 sort of fish. 



The legs of the colymbi and mergi are placed so very backward, and 

 so out of all centre of gravity, that these birds cannot walk at all. 

 They are called by Linnaeus compedes, because they move on the ground 

 as if shackled or fettered. WHITE. 



These accurate and ingenious observations, tending to set forth in 

 a proper light the wonderful works of God in the creation, and to point 

 out his wisdom in adapting the singular form and position of the 

 limbs of this bird to the particular mode in which it is destined to pass 

 the greatest] part of its life in an element much denser than the air, 

 do Mr. White credit, not only as a naturalist, but as a man and as a 

 philosopher, in the truest sense of the word, in my opinion ; for were 

 we enabled to trace the works of nature minutely and accurately, we 

 should find, not only that every bird, but every creature, was equally 

 well adapted to the purpose /or which it was intended ; though this 



