THE SWAtf. 185 



Longevity Strength Fierceness. 



feeding round them. Their fears, as well as their 

 pride, seem to take the alarm, and when in dan- 

 ger, the old birds carry off the young ones on 

 their back. 



Dr. Latham says, that he knows two females, 

 that for three or four years past have agreed to as- 

 sociate ; and have each a brood yearly, bringing 

 up together about eleven young; they sit by turns, 

 and never quarrel. When a twelve-month old 

 the young swans change their colour with their 

 plumage. All the stages of this bird's approach 

 to maturity are slow, and seem to mark its longe- 

 vity. It is two months hatching ; a year in grow- 

 ing to its proper size; and if, according to the 

 observations of Pliny, BufTon, and other natu- 

 ralists, that those animals which are longest in 

 the womb are the longest lived> the swan must 

 exceed in length of years every other, for it is 

 the longest in the shell of any bird hitherto 

 known, and indeed has been long remarkable for 

 its longevity. A goose, Mr. Willoughby ob- 

 serves, has been known to live an hundred years; 

 and the swan, from its superior size, and from its 

 harder, and firmer flesh, may naturally be sup- 

 posed to live still longer. It is a very strong 

 bird, and at times extremely fierce: it has not 

 unfrequently been known to throw down and 

 trample upon youths of fifteen or sixteen years 

 of age ; and an old swan, we are told, is able to 

 break the leg of a man with a single stroke of its 

 wing. A female, while in the act of sitting, ob- 

 VOL. iv. NO. 26. A 



