518 
CRANE. 
degree may be remarked in the common crane, is so 
striking in this Numidian bird, that all authors who 
have hitherto mentioned it, from the earliest time to 
the present day, have named it from its mimic ges- 
tures. Aristotle calls it the actor or comedian ; Pliny, 
the dancer or vaulter; and both Plutarch and Athe- 
nseus have noticed its singular manners. Though this 
bird was famous among the antients, it was little 
known, and seldom seen in Greece or Italy; and, 
confined to its own climate, it enjoyed a sort of 
fabulous celebrity. It was late before the moderns 
were acquainted with it. The six Numidian cranes 
which were kept for a considerable time in the 
French king’s menagerie, are said to have propa- 
gated there, and that the one which died last at the 
age of twenty-four, was hatched in it. We have 
nothing further to add respecting this bird, except 
that our English sailors, who are not so well acquaint- 
ed with the art of dancing as the French, call it 
the buffoon, and say that it cuts a very ridiculous 
figure. 
