THE WADING AND SWIMMING BIRDS. 181 
which are found in deeper waters and in the sea. The 
latter are well provided for in their swimming apparatus, 
and are good divers also. The Eider Duck, an inhabit- 
ant of the northern regions of both hemispheres, furnish- 
es the famous eider-down. The beautiful and graceful 
Swans belong to the Duck family. They are inhabitants 
of the east of Europe and Asia, Among the singular an- 
imals of that country so fruitful in strange things, Aus- 
tralia, there is a Swan, the whole of whose plumage is a 
jetty black. The 
Flamingo, Figure 
148, although it has 
the long legs of a 
Crane, and so is a 
good wader,is com- 
monly reckoned in 
the Duck family, 
because its feet are 
well webbed, and 
its mandibles are 
laminated as in the 
ease of the true 
Ducks. It is found 
in Africa, Asia, and 
the warmer parts 
of Europe. The 
color of the plu- 
; mage 1s a deep 
\, brilliant scarlet, ex- 
cept the quill-feath- 
ers, which are 
black. When a 
flock of these birds 
stand in a line, as 
they often do, they look like a file of small soldiers. The 
nest of the Flamingo is a conical heap made of mud, with 
a hollow place in the top. When it sits on the nest its 
Jong legs hang over the sides. 
- 
Fig. 148.—Flamingo. 
