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THE PELICAN 
translation from the original Hebrew. “ The word 
(. Kah-atU ), which is rendered 7rA£/cav in the Septuagint, 
and Pelican, or Onocrotalus, in the Vulgate, is derived 
from the verb NJJ ‘to vomit,’ and signifies ‘ a vomiter.’ 
This name, evidently a general one, may have been 
intended by the Hebrew writers to apply either to such 
birds as, like the pelican and many others, possess the 
power of disgorging their food on being disturbed or 
alarmed, or to such birds as are accustomed to nourish 
their young from their own crops ; and, in the latter case, 
the curious bloody secretion of the flamingo may well 
have given rise to the superstition concerning the pelican. 
I may observe, as an evidence that the translators did not 
consider the Hebrew word to be other than a general 
name, that Ka-atU is sometimes rendered ‘ cormorant ’ 
(Isa. xxxiv. ii ; Zeph. ii. 14). For further information 
concerning this point, I would refer your readers to the 
‘ Hebrew and Chaldee Concordance,’ p. 1083 ; Bate’s 
‘Hebrew Dictionary,’ p. 538; and Parkhurst’s ‘Hebrew 
Dictionary,’ pp. 631, 632.” 
Shakespeare, doubtless, had not investigated the 
subject so narrowly, but was content to accept the 
common story as he found it, and to apply it meta¬ 
phorically as occasion required. 
The majority of the birds mentioned in this chapter are 
not natives of the British Islands, but, strange as it may 
appear, there,is evidence to show that the pelican, or, to 
