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ROSEATE SPOONBILL. 
Having never been so fortunate as to meet with them in their 
native wilds, I regret my present inability to throw any farther 
light on their history and manners. These, it is probable, may 
resemble in many respects those of the European species, the 
White Spoonbill, once so common in Holland.* To atone for this 
deficiency, I have endeavoured faithfully to delineate the figure of 
this American species, and may perhaps resume the subject in 
some future part of the present work. 
The Roseate Spoonbill, now before us, measured two feet six 
inches in length, and near four feet in extent ; the bill was six 
inches and a half long from the corner of the mouth, seven from 
its upper base, two inches over at its greatest width, and three 
quarters of an inch where narrowest ; of a black color for half its 
length, and covered with hard scaly protuberances, like the edges 
of oyster shells; these are of a whitish tint, stained with red; the 
nostrils are oblong, and placed in the centre of the upper mandi- 
ble ; from the lower end of each there runs a deep groove along 
each side of the mandible, and about a quarter of an inch from its 
edge ; whole crown and chin bare of plumage and covered with a 
greenish skin ; that below the under mandible dilatable like those 
of the genus Pelicanus ; space round the eye orange ; irides blood 
red; cheeks and hind-head a bare black skin; neck long, covered 
with short white feathers, some of which on the upper part of the 
neck are tipt with crimson; breast white, the sides of which are 
tinged with a brown burnt color ; from the upper part of the breast 
proceeds a long tuft of fine hair-like plumage, of a pale rose color ; 
back white, slightly tinged with brownish ; wings a pale wild-rose 
* The European species breeds on trees, by the seaside ; lays three or four white eggs, 
powdered with a few pale red spots, and about the size of those of a hen ; are very noisy dur- 
ing breeding time ; feed on fish, muscles, &c., which, like the Bald Eagle, they frequently take 
from other birds, frightening them by clattering their bill ; they are also said to eat grass, weeds, 
and roots of reeds : they are migratory ; their flesh reported to savour that of a goose ; the 
young are reckoned good food. 
