AMERICAN WHITE PELICAN. 185 
when gorged with fish, is quite incorrect, for when approached, on such an 
occasion, they throw up their food, as Vultures are wont to do. 
I regret exceedingly that I cannot say any thing respecting their nests, 
eggs, or young, as I have not been in the countries in which they are said 
to breed. 
American White Pelican, Pelccanus americanus , Aud. Ord. Biog., vol. iv p. 88* 
Male, 61S, 103 ; bill, 13|. 
Common during winter from Texas to South Carolina, both along the 
coast and about the lakes and rivers adjoining the Missouri, Mississippi, 
and Ohio. Breeds from California northward to lat. 61°. Accidental in 
the Middle Atlantic Districts. 
Adult Male. 
Bill a little more than thrice the length of the head, rather slender, almost 
straight, depressed. Upper mandible linear, depressed, convex at the base, 
gradually flattened and a little enlarged to near the end, when it again nar- 
rows, and terminates in a hooked point. The ridge is broad and convex at 
the base, becomes gradually narrowed and flattened beyond the middle, is 
elevated into a thin crest about an inch high, of a fibrous structure, and about 
three inches in length (in some specimens as much as five inches) which is 
continued forwards of less elevation to the extent of an inch farther. The 
ridge of the mandible is then narrow and flat, and terminates in the unguis, 
which is oblong, slightly carinate above, curved, obtuse, concave beneath. 
The edges are very sharp and a little involute ; the lower surface of the man- 
dible has a median slender sharp ridge, on each side of which, at the distance 
of a quarter of an inch, is a stronger ridge having a groove in its whole length; 
the sides then slope upwards to the incurved margin, and in this latter space 
is received the edge of the other mandible. Lower mandible having its 
crura separated, very slender, elastic, and meeting only at the very extremity, 
so that the angle or interspace may be described as extremely long, occupy- 
ing in fact the whole length of the bill excepting four-twelfths of an inch at 
the end ; for two-thirds of its length from the base, the lower mandible is 
broader than the upper, which is owing to the crura lying obliquely, but 
beyond the crest it is narrower ; the extremely short dorsal line ascending, 
convex, the edges inflected, sharp, and longitudinally grooved. To the lower 
mandible, in place of the skin or membrane filling up the angle as in most 
other birds, is appended a vast sac seven inches in depth opposite the base of 
the bill, and extending down the throat about eight inches, so that its length 
from the tip of the lower mandible is twenty-one and a half inches. It is 
formed of the skin, which is thin, transparent, elastic, rugous, highly vas 
Vol. VII.— 24 
