316 
POPULAR HISTORY OE BIRDS. 
which is strongly compressed on the sides, and is as flat 
and elastic as an ivory paper-cutter the upper mandible 
is much shorter than the lower. Mr. Darwin, in his re- 
searches, has recorded the habits of the Bhynchops nigra 
(Plate XX. fig. 1). He found it at Maldonado, flying in 
small flocks close to the surface of a piece of water, which 
swarmed with small fry. Over this they flew backwards 
and forwards, keeping their bills wide open, and the lower 
mandible half immersed in water. "Thus skimming the 
surface, they ploughed it in their course; in their flight 
they frequently twist about with extreme rapidity, and so 
dexterously manage, that, with their projecting lower man- 
dible, they plough up small fish, which are secured by the 
upper half of their scissor-like bills.''^ Mr. Darwin has 
seen them repeatedly do this, and observed that, when 
they left the surface of the water, their flight was wild, 
irregular, and rapid, and their cries were loud and harsh. 
It is chiefly at night that they feed, when many of the lower 
animals come to the surface. Mr. Lesson, in the ^ Narrative 
of the Yoyage of the Coquille,^ says he has seen the scissor- 
beak opening the shells of Mactrm buried in sandbanks on 
the coast of Chili ; but Mr. Darwin doubts this being a ge- 
neral habit of the bird, from its weak bill, produced lower 
