A VES— ORDER PIICENICOPTERIFORMES. 



Fig. 47.— Thu Sacrbd Ieis 

 i^lhis aethiopica). 



procured in Egypt, one of them having been shot near Damietta about 



twelve years ago. We know ako that the species extends to the Persian 



Gulf, its winter home being in Eastern and 



Southern Africa. 



There are no less than twenty different genera 



of Ibises, and many of them are remarkable for 



highly developed crests and ornamental plumes, 



while in the Sacred Ibis and its allies the head 



and neck are bare. The Glossy Ibises {Plegadis) 



are among tho commonest and best known of the 



whole family, as one of them, P. falcinellus, has 



visited England on many occasions. This species 



breeds in numbers on the marshes of the lower 



Danube, as well as in similar places in Africa 



and India, and the egg is one of the most 



beautiful of any of the Heron-like birds, being 



of a deep greenish-blue, darker and richer in 



tint than the eggs of any species of Herons. 

 We now approach the great group of swimming 



birds, such as the Ducks, the Pelicans, and their 



allies ; but, before arriving at the consideration 



of these well-marked orders, there intervenes a remarkalile 

 form of bird, the Flamingo. In its long legs and long 

 neck it might well be taken for a kind of Heron or Stork; 

 and, indeed, until recent years, the position of the 

 Flamingoes was considered to be in close proximity to 

 the last-named birds. They are, however, more nearly 



allied to the Ducks and Geese, having a desmognathous or "bridged" 



palate ; while the young are hatched covered with down, and are able to run 



about in a few hours and obtain food for them- 

 selves. These features they possess in common 



with the Ducks and Geese and the Screamers, 



and these three groups were united by Huxley 



into one natural order, CheiiomorjjhcE.. 



The Flamingoes resemble the Ducks and 



Geese in having the sides of the bill laminated, 



an arrangement which enables them to sift their 



food in the way which every one of our readers 



must have seen tame Ducks do in a farmyard or 



on a lake. Besides many osteological characters, 



the Flamingoes present an external appearance 



unique among birds. The legs are abnormally- 

 long, the metatarsus being three times as 



long as the femur, and the anterior toes fully 



webbed. The neck is also extremely long, the 



cervical vertebrre being eighteen or nineteen in 



number. The bill is decurved in a remarkable 



manner; but in the nestling, which is covered 



with greyish-white down, the bill is straight, 



as in any other Duck-like bird. 



The most curious feature in the economy of the Flamingo is its nest, which 



is built of mud. For a long time it was supposed that the birds sat upon 



The Flamingoes. — 

 Order 



Thoinicopteri- 

 forme&. 



Fij. 48.— The Common Fkhinoo 

 {Phcenicoptenis rosetn). 



