Si 6 A N 
Cures to fcek all the gradations of voluptuoufnefs. They 
begin by entwining their necks; and thus breathe the in¬ 
toxication of a long embrace ; they communicate the fire 
which kindles in their veins; and after the male has fully 
indulged his appetite, the female fill burns ; (lie purfues, 
and even excites him anew ; and then leaves him, with 
regret, to waft in the water, and quench her remaining 
ardour. The fruits of thefe embraces are tenderly che- 
riflied and foftered. The mother gathers, night and day, 
the young under her wings, and the father is ready to de¬ 
fend them with intrepidity againfl every alfailant. But 
his courage, on fuch occafions, bears no comparifon to the 
fury with which he attacks a rival that intrudes on the 
poflefli'cm of his beloved object. He then forgets his mild- 
nefs, becomes ferocious, and fights with obflinate rancour; 
and a wliole day is often in'tifiicient to terminate the qttav, 
tel. They begin witli (triking violently their wings, then 
join dole, and perfifl till commonly-'one of them is killed ; 
for they drive to flifle each other by locking the neck, and 
forcibly holding the head under water. It was probably 
thefe combats that made the ancients imagine that the 
fvvans devoured one another. Nothing is wider of the 
truth ; only in this, as in other cafes, furious panions ori¬ 
ginate from a padion the mod delicious ; and it is love that 
begets war. At every other time, their habits are peace¬ 
ful, and all their fentiments are attuned to love. As at¬ 
tentive to neatnels as they are addicted to pleafure, they 
are afliducus each day in the care of their perfon : they 
arrange their plumage, they clean and fmooth it; they 
take water in their bill, and fprinkle it on their back and 
wings with an attention that implies thededreof pleafing, 
and which cat) only be repaid by the confcioufnefs of being 
loved. The only time when the female r.egleCts her attire, 
is that of incubation; Iter maternal folicitude then entirely 
occupies her thoughts, and hardly does die fpare a few 
moments for the relief and fupport of nature. 
The cygnets are hatched very ugly, and covered only 
with a grey or yellowilh down like goflings. Their feathers 
do not fprout till a few weeks after, and are dill of the 
lame colour. This unfightly plumage changes after the 
fird moult, in the month of September: they alfume many 
white feathers, and others rather flaxen than grey, efpe- 
cially on the bread and the back. This laced plumage 
drops at the (econd moult, and it is not till eighteen 
.months, or even two years, that thefe birds are inveded 
with their robe of pure and fpotlefs white ; nor before that 
age can they have young. The cygnets follow their mo¬ 
ther the fil'd hummer, but they are compelled to leave her 
in the month of November, being chafed away by the 
adult males, who wifh to enjoy entirely the company of the 
females. Thefe young birds, thus exiled from their fa¬ 
mily, unite in one body, and never feparate till they pair. 
As the fwan often eats marfh-plants, and particularly 
the algae, it prefers rivers of a fmooth and winding courfe, 
■whole banks are well clothed with herbage. The ancients 
have cited the Meander, the Mincio, the Strymon, the 
Cayder, as dreams covered with fwans. Paphos, the loved 
ide of Venus, was filled with them. Strabo (peaks of the 
fwans of Spain ; and according to yElian they were feen, 
at times, on the fea of Africa. From this and other ac¬ 
counts, we may conclude, that the fpecies. penetrates into 
the regions of the fouth : yet the north feems the true 
country pf the fwan, where it breeds and multiplies. 
With-us wild fvvans are fcarcely ever feen, but in the 
harded winters. Gefner fays, that in Switzerland, along 
and fevere winter is expected, when many fwans arrive 
on the lakes. In the fame cold feafon, they appear on 
the coads of France and of England, and on the Thames. 
Many of our tame fwans would then join the wild ones, 
did we not clip the great feathers of their wings. Yet 
fome fwans nedle and pafs the dimmer in the northern parts 
4 )f Germany, in Pruflia, and Poland ; and on nearly the 
■fame parallel of latitude, they are found on the rivers 
about Azof and Adracan; in Siberia, among the Jacutes; 
in Scleginfkki, and as far ,as Kamtfchatka. During the 
A S. 
breeding feafon, they are found in immenfe numbers on 
the dreams and lakes of Lapland : there they feed on the 
larvae of the gnat, which cover the furface of the water. 
The Laplanders fee them arrive in the fpring from the 
German Ocean : part dop in Sweden, and efpecially in 
Scania. Horrebow affirms, that they continue the whole 
year in Iceland, and inhabit the fea when the frelh waters 
are frozen. But, if a few do remain, the bulk of them fol¬ 
low the common law of migration, and fly from a winter, 
which, as the fltoals of ice are driven from Greenland, is 
attended with greater rigour in Iceland than in Lapland. 
In Augudthey lofe their feathers, and are notable to fly, 
when the natives of Iceland and Kamtfchatka hunt them 
with dogs, which catch them by the neck, and eafily fe¬ 
cit ve them in this defencelefs date. The eggs are accounted 
good food, and the fie(h is much edeemed by the inhabit¬ 
ants.- Thefe birds are as numerous in the northern parts 
of America as in thofe of Europe. They inhabit Hudfon’s 
Bay, and are likewise very numerous in Canada, from 
whence they appear to migrate for winter quarters into 
Virginia and Louifiana. 
The did'erences which fubfid between the wild or vvhifl- 
ling fwan, and the tame or mute fwan, which is bred in 
England, have led to the opinion that they form two dif- 
tin6i and feparate fpecies. The whidling (wan carries its 
neck quite ereft, the other fwiins with it arched. It is alfo 
far inferior in fize, and has twelve ribs on a fide, the mute 
only eleven. But the mod remarkable is the drange figure 
of the windpipe ; which falls into the ched, then turns 
back like a trumpet, and afterwards makes a fecond bend 
to join the lungs. Thus it is enabled to utter a loud and 
flirill note. The mute fwan, on the contrary, is the mod 
lilent of birds : it can do little more than hifs, which it 
does on receiving any provocation. The vocal kind emits 
its loud notes only when flying or calling. Its found is 
very loud and flirill, but not difagreeable when heard far 
above one’s head and modulated by the winds. The na¬ 
tives of Iceland compare it to the notes of a violin. In 
fa6l, they hear it, fays Mr. Pennant, at the end of their 
long and gloomy winter, when the return of the fvvans an¬ 
nounces the return of fummer; every note mud be there¬ 
fore melodious which prefages the fpeedy thaw, and the 
releafe from their tedious confinement. The tame fwan is, 
however, regarded as a breed derived anciently and origin¬ 
ally from the wild fpecies. Klein, Frifch, and Linnaeus, 
have formed this opinion; though Willoughby and Ray 
pretend the contrary. The figure of the wild fwan given 
in the annexed plate, may be depended upon as an exadt 
copy of nature. The drawing was made from the real bird 
by the ingenious Mr. Edwards, and placed in his valuable 
and elegant collection of fubjeCis in natural hiflory. 
Belon reckons the fwan to be the larged of the aquatic 
birds; which is true, excepting, however, that the pelican 
has a much greater alar extent, that the albatrofs is as 
bulky, and that the flamingo is taller on its legs. The 
tame fwans are invariably thicker and larger than the wild 
fort: fome of them weigh twenty-five pounds, and mea- 
fure, from the bill to the tail, four feet and an half; the 
breadth of the wings eight feet. The female is, in every 
dimenfion, rather fmaller than the male. The bill ufually 
exceeds two inches in length, and, in the tame kind, has 
above its bale a flefiiy tubercle, inflated and prominent, 
which gives a fort of ex predion : this tubercle is covered 
with a black (kin ; and the fldes of the face, under the 
eyes, are covered with a (kin of the fame colour. In cyg¬ 
nets of the domedic breed, the bill is of a leaden cad, 
and afterwards becomes yellow or white, with the point 
black. In the wild kind, the bill is entirely black, with 
a yellow membrane on the front; its form feems to be 
copied in the two mod numerous families of the palmipede 
birds, the geefe and ducks. In all of thefe the bill is 
flat, thick, indented on the edges, rounded into a blunt 
tip, and terminated on the upper mandible by a nail of 
horny fubflance. 
Swans, .almoft mute, like ours in the domedic date, 
j could 
