682 AVES— PENGUIN. 



As the wings of the penguin tribe are unfitted for flight, the legs are still 

 more awkwardly adapted for walking. This whole tribe have all above the 

 knee hid within the belly ; and nothing appears but two short legs, or feet, 

 as some would call them, that seem stuck under the rump, and upon which 

 the animal is very awkwardly supported. They seem, when sitting, or 

 attempting to walk, like a dog that has been taught to sit up, or to move a 

 minuet. Their short legs drive the body in progression from side to side; 

 and were they not assisted by their wings, they could scarcely move faster 

 than a tortoise. 



This awkward position of the legs, which so disqualifies them for living 

 upon land, adapts them admirably for a residence in water ; in that, the 

 legs, placed behind the moving body, push it forward with greater velocity ; 

 and these birds, like Indian canoes, are the swiftest in the water, by having 

 their paddles in the rear. 



They are also covered more warmly all over the body with feathers, than 

 any other birds whatever; so that the sea seems entirely their element. 



THE PATAGONIAN PENGUIN' 



Weighs about forty pounds, and is four feet three inches in length. The 

 bill measures four inches and a half, but is slender. The head, throat, and 

 hind part of the neck, are brown ; the back of a deep ash color ; and all the 

 Under parts white. The Magellanic penguin is about the size of a goose ; 

 the upper parts of the plumage are black, and the under white. These birds 

 walk erect, with their heads on high, their fin-like wings hanging down like 

 arms ; so that to see them at a distance, they look like so many children 

 with white aprons. Hence they are said to unite in themselves the qualities 

 of men, fowls, and fishes. Like men, they are upright ; like fowls, they 

 are feathered ; and, like fishes, they have fin-like instruments, that beat the 

 water before, and serve for all the purposes of swimming rather than flying. 



ORDER XVI. — INERTE S. 



Birds of this order have the bill of different forms ; body probably thick, 

 covered with down, and feathers with distant webs; legs placed much 

 behind ; tarsus short ; three toes before, divided to the base ; hind toe short 



' Aptenodytes Patachonica, Lath. The genus Aptenodytes has the bill longer than the 

 head, slender, straight, inflected at the tip ; upper mandible furrowed throughout its 

 whole length, the under wider at the base, and covered with a naked and smooth skin ; 

 nostrils in the upper part of the bill concealed by the feathers of the forehead ; legs very 

 short, thick, placed far behind ; four toes directed forward, three of which are webbed, 

 and the fourth very short; wings incapable of flight. 



