THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
“ Pelecanus aquilus. Osb. iter. 292. 
* 
Habitat in Insula Adscensionis aliisque pelagicis, vitam agens Diomedeee 
exulis, cui similis.” 
The additional references are to “ Brown, jam. 483. Laet. amer. 575. 
Sloan, jam. 1, p. 30. Pet. gaz., t. 45, f. 1 (?). Alb. av. 3, p. 75, t. 80, male.” 
These are purely of historical interest, as Linne’s species is based on 
Osbeck’s account and locality. In every probability the only specimen Linne 
had seen was the one Osbeck brought back. Consequently Osbeck’s account 
is valuable ; the reference to the Amoen. Acad, was to a paper by Osbeck 
at that time unpublished. In his Dagbok Ostind. Reise, p. 292, 1757, Osbeck 
described the specimen procured at Ascension Island, and I give Forster’s 
Translation, Vol. II., p. 87, 1771, for easy reference: — 
Pelecanus aquilus : its bill is more than a hand’s breadth long, and is 
narrow ; the upper jaw is somewhat the longest, with a hook-shaped point ; 
the cere, which is blue, covers the bill from the eyes to the hook-shaped 
point ; the mandibles have no such serrated incisions (supplying the place 
of teeth) as are usually found in sea birds ; the head is covered with short 
feathers as far as the eyes, which are pretty large ; the tongue is large, 
almost trifid at the top ; the corner at its bottom is split ; the temples are 
naked ; the wings consist of three parts and are very long ; of the twenty- two 
quill-feathers, the first ten are of a considerable length ; the two inner joints 
contain, besides the coverts, twenty-two secondary feathers ; the outward of 
the twelve tail-feathers are much longer than the middle ones, which make 
the tail look like a pair of scissors. The bird is about the size of a goose and 
is a yard long ; the colour of the whole body, and of the toes, is black, but 
the head, breast, belly and fore-part of the neck are of a fine white. Its 
food is fishes, which it takes from others because it is not formed to catch 
them itself ; the English for this reason call it Man-of-War.” 
The paragraph preceding this, again quoting from Forster’s translation, 
is worthy of reproduction : 
“ The Pelican, with the red bag under its neck, flew up and down, but 
would never settle. It is the same which, in hieroglyphical descriptions, is 
used as the emblem of great tenderness towards its young. It lives 
generally in the great African sandy deserts, where no water is to be met 
with, but it brings it for many miles in the bag below its throat, and fills 
the nest of its young ones : whither camels and other animals likewise resort 
to assuage their thirst. People who have seen it emptying its red water-bag 
have thought that it ripped up its breast and gave its young ones blood for 
want of water ; but they were mistaken.” 
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