1174 The Zoologist — April, 1868. 



fellows drowned. I knows what makes the noise, sir; it's them long- 

 billed curlews, but I never likes to hear V/«." 



Snipe. — Simrock says that the snipe was sacred to Thor, because 

 its flight was believed to forbode a storm. One of its German names 

 is "donner-ziege" (thunder-goal), and in some parts of France it 

 is called " chevre-volant," because the humming sound which it makes 

 in spring is supposed to resemble the bleating of a goat; hence also 

 one of its Scotch names " heather-bleat." 



Bernicle Goose. — The ancient fancy of mediaeval naturalists, from 

 which this bird takes its English name, has been already noticed by 

 Mr. Harting (Zool. S. S. 661). There appears, however, to have been 

 some doubt as to the species thus produced ; generally it was said to 

 be the " barnicle " or " brant-goose," but Butler says that it was the 

 gannet : — 



" From the most refined of saints 



As naturally grow miscreants, 

 As baniicles turn so/and yeese 

 In lh' islands of the Orcades." 



Hudibras. 



Swan. — On the subject of the death-song of the swan, I must again 

 refer the reader to Mr. Harting's notes (Zool. S. S. 663): in Pope's 

 'Rape of the Lock' also we read 



"Thus on Meander's flowery margin lies 

 The expiring swan, and as he sings, he dies.'' 



Great Northern Direr. — Of this bird the Rev. Lucas J. Debes 

 writes, in his ' Description of Foeroe ' (Englished by John Slorpin, 

 Doctor of Phvsick, 1671), that it has "two holes, one under each of its 

 wings, capable to hold an egg, wherein they (the natives) suppose it 

 hatcheth its eggs, till the young ones come out, neither is it ever seen 

 with more or less than two young ones, which conceit seems not 

 unreasonable." 



Pelican. — The old story of the pelican feeding her young with blood 

 from her own breast has been alluded to by Sbakspeare in two or three 

 passages (Hamlet, Act iv., Scene 5 : Richard II., Act ii., Scene 1 ; 

 King Lear, Act iii., Scene 1) which appear to have escaped Mr. 

 Harting's researches. In heraldry the blazon sometimes occurs of 

 "a pelican in her piety." 



