OF THE PERSONALITY OF THE DEITY. 
243 
the species has been employed from the most ancient times 
of the world. The first race, by the daily loading of the 
back, would probably find a small grumous tumour to be 
formed in the flesh of that part. The next progeny would 
bring this tumour into the world with them. The life to 
which they were destined would increase it. The cause 
which first generated the tubercle being continued, it would 
go on, through every succession, to augment its size, till it 
attained the form and the bulk under which it now appears. 
This may serve for one instance: another, and that also of 
the passive sort, is taken from certain species of birds. 
Birds of the crane kind, as the crane itself, the heron, bit¬ 
tern, stork, have, in general, their thighs bare of feathers. 
This privation is accounted for from the habit of wading in 
water, and from the effect of that element to check the 
growth of feathers upon these parts; in consequence of 
which, the health and vegetation of the feathers declined 
through each generation of the animal; the tender down, 
exposed to cold and wetness, became weak, and thin, and 
rare, till the deterioration ended in the result which we see, 
of absolute nakedness. I will mention a third instance, 
because it is drawn from an active habit, as the two last 
were from passive habits; and that is the 'pouch of the pe¬ 
lican. The description, which naturalists give of this organ, 
is as follows: “From the lower edges of the under chap 
hangs a bag, reaching from the whole length of the bill to 
the neck, which is said to be capable of containing fifteen 
quarts of water. This bag the bird has a power of wrink¬ 
ling up into the hollow of the under chap. When the bag 
is empty, it is not seen; but when the bird has fished with 
success, it is incredible to what an extent it is often dilated. 
The first thing the pelican does in fishing, is to fill the bag; 
and then it returns to digest its burden at leisure. The 
bird preys upon large fishes, and hides them by dozens in 
its pouch. When the bill is opened to its widest extent, a 
person may run his head into the bird’s mouth, and conceal 
it in this monstrous pouch, thus adapted for very singular 
purposes.”* Now this extraordinary conformation is noth¬ 
ing more, say our philosophers, than the result of habit; 
not of the habit or effort of a single pelican, or of a single 
race of pelicans, but of a habit perpetuated through a long 
series of generations. The pelican soon found the con- 
veniency of reserving in its mouth, when its appetite was 
glutted, the remainder of its prey, which is fish. The ful- 
* Goldsmith, vol. vi. p. 52 
