THE TROPIC BIRD. 



287 



Linn^us has given to the tropic bird, runs no risk 

 now of being lost, like those of some of its congeners, 

 in the impenetrable obscurity which hangs over the 

 modern nomenclature of birds. 



Far, far away from land, where the Atlantic 

 waves roll beneath the northern tropic, our mariners 

 are often favoured with a view of the bird which 

 I am about to describe. The total absence of all 

 other winged inhabitants of air, save now and then 

 a Mother Carey's chicken, renders the appearance 

 of Phaeton very interesting in this sequestered 

 region of the deep ; and every soul on board hastens 

 to get a glance at him, as he wings his lonely way 

 through the liquid void. 



The plumage of this bird is black and white ; but 

 the white on the upper parts of the body is not 

 pure, having a tinge of salmon colour in it. The 

 whole of the skin itself is entirely black. A streak 

 of black feathers, two eighths of an inch broad, 

 ranges from the upper mandible to the eyes, and is 

 continued from thence in a curved line downwards^ 

 for nearly an inch and a half in extent. Another 

 range of black feathers commences at the shoulders, 

 and ends with the tertials. Some of the feathers in 

 it are tipped with white, and others are edged with 

 it, whilst others, again, are quite black. The outer 

 web, on the first five feathers is black ; and nearly 

 half of the inner web is of the same colour ; the 

 ends of these feathers being irregularly tipped with 

 white, which prevails more in the first feather than 

 in the remaining four. A tuft of dark-coloured 

 feathers with white edges adorns the thighs, and 



