Oafs H. SWAL L O W S. 253 



geration, rauft provoke a fmile. They affign not 

 the finalleft reafon to account for thefe birds being 

 able to endure fo long a fubmerfion without being 

 fuffocaced, or without decaying, in an element fo un- 

 natural to fo delicate a bird ; when we know that the 

 otter*, the cormorant, and the grebes, foon perifhjf 

 caught under ice, or entangled in nets : and it is well 

 known, that thole animals will continue much longer 

 under water than any others to whom nature hath de- 

 nied that particular ftructure of heart, necefiary for a 

 long refidence beneath that element. 



* Though entirely fadsfied in our own mind of the impoffibility 

 of thefe reiations ; ye'., defirous of ftrengthening our opinion with 

 fome better authority, we applied to that able anatomift, Mr. 

 John Hunter; who was fo obliging to inform us, that he had dif- 

 fered many fwallows, but found nothing in them different from 

 other birds as to rhe organs of refpiration. That all thole animals 

 which he had differed of theclafs that fleep during winter, fuch 

 as lizards, frogs, &c. had a very different conformation as to 

 thofe organs. That all thefe animals, he believes, do breathe in 

 their torpid ftate; and, as far as his experience reaches, he knows 

 they do: and that therefore he efteems it a very wild opinion that 

 teireltrial animals can remain any long time under water without 

 drowning. 



S 3 Genus 



