170 On the Ornithology of Wilts. 



unlike two pieces of leather. It is curious that in the young birds 

 (which do not come to maturity and assume the adult plumage till 

 the third year) the beak is soft and flexible, not so large as, and 

 without the roughness so conspicuous in, the adults. 



Another and very remarkable peculiarity in the same organ is 

 presented by the Shoveller, or as it is provincially styled, the 

 " Broad-bill." This duck feeds chiefly in shallow water, or marshes, 

 lakes, rivers, and muddy shores ; its food consists of grasses, and 

 decayed vegetable matter as well as worms and insects, to detect 

 and separate which from the mud and the water in which they are 

 contained, the beak is singularly adapted ; in shape this instrument 

 is long, broad, depressed, the tip rounded like a spoon, and termi- 

 nated by a small hooked nail ; internally the mandibles are 

 furnished with rows of thin, comb-like bristles; these seem to be 

 very susceptible of feeling, and enable the bird to select the nutri- 

 tious and reject the useless food, whilst this beautiful instrument, 

 forming with the tongue a perfect sieve or strainer, retains only 

 what is fit for sustenance. It was commonly supposed by natu- 

 ralists that the beak of the young of this species when first hatched 

 was dilated like that of the adult bird, and was therefore as broad 

 as the body, and quite out of proportion to the size of the duck- 

 ling: farther investigation has, however, proved this to be erro- 

 neous ; and as the young of the crossbill and the spoonbill described 

 above, so the young of the shoveller when first hatched, presents 

 no peculiarity in the beak. 



There are several other birds presenting very singular beaks, and 

 each exactly suited to the habits of its owner, but to describe which 

 at length would extend this paper too much. That of the wood- 

 cock and snipe, to which I have slightly alluded above deserves 

 close attention, as being most delicate and beautiful ; it is extremely 

 long, the point of it dimpled, soft, spongy, and cellular; and 

 exhibits great sensibility ; it is repeatedly thrust up to the base in 

 the soft mud by the sides of springs or in water-meadows, and so 

 susceptible is it of the finest feeling that this sensitive organ can 

 detect the prey of which it is in search the instant it comes in 

 contact with it, though it is necessarily out of sight. 



I 



