330 
THE FLAMINGO. 
are found in England. Near Holyhead, in the island of 
Anglesey, a very fine specimen was shot and preserved, in 
1832. It was first seen early in May, feeding at low water, i 
in company with some Herons, on the marine productions ! 
left hy the tide, hut was so shy that some weeks had elapsed 
before it was killed, at three o’clock in the morning, by a 
man who had marked its roosting-place on a small rocky 
island, accessible only on foot at low water. Another was 
also killed about this time, at no great distance from the 
same place. When rising from the grdund, it always made 
several wide circles before getting into full flight. It was j 
very shy, and never could he approached nearer than one 
hundred yards. 
The Flamingo is hy far the most striking of these three 
genera • its scientific name is JPhoenicopterus , from two 
Greek words, signifying “ wings of flame,” their beautiful 
carnation colour contrasting with the plumes of the neck and 
body, which in one species are of delicate white. It is a 
most extraordinary bird. Its legs are of an excessive length, 
and so slender, that at a little distance, standing, as they 
usually do, on one alone, it is not easily seen, and the bird 
appears as if stationary in the air. But the chief singularity 
is in the hill, which the an- 
nexed figure will explain better 
than any verbal description. 
With this misshapen instru- 
ment, it would appear, that 
the act of collecting food must j 
he an affair of some difficulty ; 
— an opinion rather confirmed j 
hy the still more extraordinary 
manner in which it feeds. On looking at the plate, it will ; 
he seen that, owing to the sudden curvature, or almost broken 
and deformed appearance of the beak, food, collected in the 
usual way, must naturally drop from the mouth ; and so it 
would, if the bird fed as other birds do ; hut it adopts its own 
method, by turning its head and scooping up the soft sub- i 
stances on which it preys, using the upper mandible as a 
