272 REPTILES AND BIRDS. 



has given origin to the absurd fable that the female Pelican is in 

 the habit of piercing her breast in order to nourish her young with 

 her maternal blood. The young birds are easily tamed ; it is even 

 asserted that they are susceptible of education, and that, like the 

 young Cormorants, they can be taught to fish for their owners. 



The Pelican is more common in tropical regions than in tempe- 

 rate climates. They are very numerous in Africa, Siam, Madagascar, 

 the Sunda Isles, the Philippines ; and in the Western Hemisphere 

 they abound from the Antilles to the northern temperate part of the 

 North American continent. It haunts the neighbourhood of rivers 

 and lakes and the sea-coast, being rarely seen more than twenty 

 leagues from the land. Levaillant describes one of those wonderful 

 ornithological scenes which only occur in uninhabited regions. At 

 the entrance of Saldanha Bay, on the south-west coast of Africa, after 

 wading through the surf and clambering up the rocks, "all of a 

 sudden there arose from the surface of the Island of Dassen-Eyland 

 an impenetrable cloud, which formed, at the distance of forty feet 

 above our heads, an immense canopy, composed entirely of aquatic 

 birds — cormorants, sea gulls, sea swallows, pelicans, and I believe the 

 whole winged tribes of this part of Africa were here assembled. 

 Their voices, harsh and discordant, formed a noise so unmusical that 

 I was every moment compelled to cover my head in order to relieve 

 my ears. The alarm we created was so much the more general, inas- 

 much as the birds disturbed were chiefly sitting females. They had 

 nests, eggs, and young to defend." In this scene the Pelican, from 

 its peculiar appearance, was of course a prominent object. The best- 

 known species are — 1. The Crested Pelican. 2. The White Pelican. 

 3. The Brown Pelican. 4. The Spectacled Pelican. 



The Crested Pelican (Pehcanus o?iocrotahis). 



The Crested Pelican (Fig. 100), in common with the White Pelican, 

 inhabits the south-east of Europe and Africa, and is also found in 

 Hungary, Dalmatia, Greece, the Crimea, and the Ionian Islands, as 

 well as in Algeria, and, according to some authors, it is frequently 

 met with in China.* 



It has white plumage, with the exception that the ends of the 

 feathers of the back and wings are black. The feathers of the head 

 and upper part of the neck are twisted up so as to form a tolerably 



* On the Chinese coast, near Canton, and in the estuaries and creeks of 

 Miers Bay, I have frequently found it. — Ed. 



