130 



SNAKE-BIED. 



protuberance ; the neck, near its centre, takes a singular bend, in order 

 to enable the bird to dart forward its bill, with velocity, when it takes 

 its prey ; legs and feet of a yellowish clay color, the toes, and the hind 

 part of the legs, with a dash of dusky ; claws greatly falcated ; when 

 the wings are closed, they extend to the centre of the tail. 



Length from the tip of the bill to the end of the tail two feet ten 

 inches,* breadth three feet ten inches ; bill to the angle of the mouth 

 full four inches ; tail ten inches and a half, composed of twelve broad 

 and stiif feathers. Weight three pounds and a half. 



The serratures of the bill are extremely sharp, so much so, that when 

 one applies tow, or such like substance, to the bird's mouth, it is with 

 difficulty disengaged. 



The lower mandible and throat, as in the Divers, are capable of great 

 expansion, to facilitate the swallowing of fish, which constitute the food 

 of this species. The position of these birds, when standing, is like that 

 of the Gannets. 



The above description was taken from a fine adult male specimen, 

 which was shot by my fellow-traveller, Mr. T. Peale, on the first of 

 March, 1818, in a creek below the Cow Ford, situated on the river 

 St. John, in East Florida. We saw some others in the vicinity, but 

 owing to their extreme vigilance and shyness, we could not procure 

 them. 



From the description of the White-bellied Darter of Latham and 

 others, which is unquestionably this species, one would be inclined to 

 conjecture, that the bird figured in our plate, as the female, is the 

 young male. But this point it is not in my power to ascertain. The 

 specimens in Peale' s Museum, from which Wilson took his figures, were 

 labelled male and female. All the Darters which I saw, while in Florida, 

 were males. 



The Snake-bird is an inhabitant of the Carolinas, Georgia, the 

 Floridas and Louisiana ; and is common in Cayenne and Brazil. It 

 seems to have derived its name from the singular form of its head and 

 neck, which, at a distance, might be mistaken for a serpent. In those 

 countries where noxious animals abound, we may readily conceive, that 

 the appearance of this bird, extending its slender neck through the 

 foliage of a tree, would tend to startle the wary traveller, whose imagi- 

 nation had portrayed objects of danger lurking in every thicket. Its 

 habits, too, while in the water, have not a little contributed to its name. 



* The admeasurement of the specimen, described in the first edition of this work, 

 was made by Wilson himself, from the stuffed bird in Peale's Museum. It differed 

 considerably from that described above ; but as our specimen was a very fine one, 

 there is room to conjecture that there was some error in the admeasurement of the 

 former, ours being described immediately after death. 



