DARTER, OR SNAKE-BIRD. 105 
opportunity than when swimming of observing their finny 
prey. ‘They crawl from the water upon the limbs, and fix 
themselves in an upright position, which they maintain in the 
utmost silence. If there be foliage, or the long moss, they 
secrete themselves in if in such a manner that they cannot be 
perceived, unless one be close to them. When approached, 
they drop into the water with such surprising skill, that one is 
astonished how so large a body can plunge with so little noise, 
the agitation of the water being apparently not greater than 
that occasioned by the gliding of an eel. 
Formerly the darter was considered by voyagers as an ano- 
malous production, a monster partaking of the nature of the 
snake and the duck; and, insome ancient charts which I have 
seen, it is delineated in all the extravagance of fiction. 
From Mr William Bartram we have received the following 
account of the subject of our history :— 
“ Here is in this river,* and in the waters all over Florida, 
a very curious and handsome bird,—the people call them 
snake-birds ; I think I have seen paintings of them on the 
Chinese screens and other Indian pictures ; they seem to be a 
species of Colymbus, but far more beautiful and delicately 
formed than any other that Ihave ever seen, They delight to 
sit in little peaceable communities, on the dry limbs of trees, 
hanging over the still waters, with their wings and tails ex- 
panded, I suppose to cool and air themselves, when at the same 
time they behold their images in the watery,mirror. At such 
times, when we approach them, they drop off the limbs into 
the water as if dead, and for a minute or two are not to be 
seen ; when on a sudden, at a great distance, their long slender 
head and neck appear, like a snake rising erect out of the 
water ; and no other part of them is to be seen when swimming, 
except sometimes the tip end of their tail. In the heat of the 
day they are seen in great numbers, sailing very high in the 
air over lakes and rivers. 
“JT doubt not but if this bird had been an inhabitant of the 
Tiber in Ovid’s days, it would have furnished him with a sub- 
* The river St Juan, East Florida. 
