may be from the view of the Birds as if near a Barn-door by casting Chaff upon it c. Observe also first to have some Covert to hide your person in where you may see and not be seen Secondly not to be too hasty in striking but stay till you have a full number under the reach of your Net and then pull freely and quickly §. II. Of taking Birds with Day-nets THE time of the Year for these Nets is from August till November Of the Day a little before Sun-rise so as your Nets may be laid and all your Implements in readiness to begin your work by peep of Sun The milder the Air and the clearer and brighter the Morning the fitter is the season for this exercise The best place is in Champain Countries remote from any Town Village or common concourse of people on short Barley stubbles smooth green Layes or level Meadows if the place be not naturally even and plain where you pitch your Nets you must make it so That both lying and falling over they may couch so close to the ground that the shortest grass or stubble appearing through them they may as it were lie hid and unperceived by the Birds and that being covered they may not creep or flicker from under them Let your Nets be made of very fine Packthread knit sure the Mash not above an Inch square Let them be about three fathoms long and not above one deep verged on each side with strong small Cords the ends extended upon two small Poles as long as the Net is broad c. in all things like the Net described § I. save that that was to be but one single Net but here you must have two exactly of the same size and fashion and placed at that distance that when they are drawn the sides may just meet and touch one another Your Nets being staked down with strong stakes so that with any nimble twitch you may cast them to and fro at pleasure some twenty or thirty paces from the Nets place your Giggs on the tops of long Poles turned into the wind so as they may play and make a noise therein These Giggs are made of long Goose-feathers in the manner of Shuttle-cocks and with little turnels of wood running in broad and flat Swan-quills made round like a small hoop and so with longer strings fastned to the Pole will with any small wind twirl and flicker in the Air after such a wanton manner that the Birds will come in great flocks to wonder and play about the same After the placing of your Giggs you shall then place your Stale which is a small stake of wood to prick down fast in the earth having in it a Morteise hole in which a long slender piece of wood of about two foot is so fastned that it may move up and down at pleasure and to this longer stick you shall fasten a small Line which running through a hole in the stake aforesaid and so coming up to the place where you sit you may by drawing the Line up and down to you with your right hand raise and mount the longer stick from the ground as oft as you shall find occasion Now to this longer stick you shall fasten a live Lark or Bunting for you must be sure ever to preserve some alive for that purpose or for want of such any other small Bird which the Line making to flicker up and down by your pulling will entice the Larks to play about it and swoop so near the ground that drawing your hand you may cover them with your Nets at pleasure Also it will entice Hawks and any other Birds of prey to stoop and strike at the same so as you may with ease take them There is also another Stale called the Looking-glass and this is a round stake of wood as big as a mans Arm and made very sharp at the nether end so as you may thrust and fasten it into the earth at your pleasure This Stake is made very hollow in the upper part above five fingers deep at the least into this hollowness is placed a three-square piece of wood about twelve Inches long and each square two Inches broad lying upon the top of the Stake and going with a foot into the hollowness which foot must have a great knob at the top and another at the bottom with a deep slenderness between them to which slenderness must be fastned a small Packthread which running through a hole in the side of the Stake must come up to the seat where you sit Now the three-square piece of wood which lies on the top of the Stake must be made of such a true poise and evenness and the foot in the Socket so round and smooth that upon the least touch it will twirl and turn round like a Scoperil winding the Packthread so many times about it which being suddenly drawn and as suddenly let go again will keep the Engine in a perpetual round motion like a Childs Mill made of a Nut a stick and an Apple This done you shall with Glue or other strong Cement fasten upon the uppermost squares of the three-square piece about twenty small pieces of Looking-glass and paint all the sparewood between them of a very bright red colour which in the continual motion and turning about will give such a glorious reflection that the wanton Birds cannot forbear but will play about it with admiration till they be taken Now both these Stales are to be placed in the very midst between the two Nets and about two or three foot distant one from another so that in the falling of the Nets the Cords may by no means touch or annoy them Neither must they stand one before or after another but in a direct Line one over against another the glass being kept continually moving and the Bird very oft flickering When you have thus placed your nets Giggs and Stales you shall then go to the further end of your long drawing Lines and stale-Stale-lines and having a little Hassock made of Sedge about a foot or better high you shall place it within a yard or little more of the end of the same And then sitting down upon the Hassock lay the main drawing Line with a strong button of wood made fast in the same upon your thigh and with your right hand continually draw the grass-Line and with your left the Stale-line and when you shall perceive the Larks or other birds to play near and about your Nets and Stales swooping near and to the ground you shall then with both hands pull the Net over and cover and take your prey If the weather be good be not too hasty to pluck at a single bird but stay till you see many playing about your Nets Behind the Seat you sit on lay your spare Instruments and Implements which you are to use about the whole Work as Spare-stakes Poles Lines Packthread Knitting-pin and Needle your Bag with Stales a Mallet to knock
is acquired by practice and exercise by diligently observing the true colour of the Partridge how it differeth from the ground and also the manner of their lying This is the easier done because when you have once as you think apprehended them with your eye you may walk nearer and nearer till you are absolutely sure you see them provided you be ever moving and stand not still or gaze at them for that they will not abide else they are soslothful and unwilling to take wing that till you be ready to set your foot upon them they will not stir Others find them by the haunts and places where they last coucht which they know partly by their dung there left which if new will be soft and the white part of it colour their fingers and partly by their padlings or treadings which if new will be soft and dirty and the earth new broken of a darker colour than the mould about it and being very new indeed the place where they sate will be warm and the ground smooth and flat with some small feathers or down scattered upon it If you find such a haunt you may be confident the birds are not far off Therefore look carefully about you especially down the Lands walking leisurely and in a short time you will espy them which as soon as you do you shall presently wind off from them and by no means look towards them and so fetch a large circumference round about them keeping an ordinary round march making your compass less and less till you have discovered the whole Covey Others find them by going early in the Morning or at the close of the Even which are called Juking times into their haunts and there listning for the calling of the Cock-Partridge which will be very loud and earnest to which after some few calls the Hen will make answer which as soon as they hear they listen till they meet which they shall very well perceive by their chattering and rejoycing one with another Then they take their range about them drawing nearer and nearer as before till they discover the whole Covey But the best safest easiest and most pleasant way of finding them is by the Partridge-call Having learnt the true and natural notes of the Partridge and being able to tune every note in its proper key and knowing the due times and seasons for every note so as fitly to accommodate them go forth either Morning or Evening to their haunts and having conveyed your self into some close place so as to see and not be seen listen a while if you can hear the Partridge call If you do answer them again in the same note and ever as they change or double or treble their note so shall you likewise plying still your Call till you find them draw near to you For this calling is so natural and delightful to them that they will pursue it as far as they can hear it Having drawn them within your view cast your self flat upon your back and lie without moving as if you were dead and you shall then see them running and pecking about you without any fear so as you may take a full view of them and if you please count their number §. II. How to take Partridge with Nets THese Nets may be made in all points like the Phesant-nets only the Mash somewhat smaller but they would be much better were they something longer and broader Having found the Covey draw forth your Nets and taking a large Circumference about them walk a good round pace with a careless eye rather from than toward the Partridge till you have fitted your Nets and then draw in your Circumference less and less till you come within the length of your Net where as you walk about for no stop or stay must be made prick down a stick of about three foot long and to it fasten one end of the Line of your Net Then letting the Net slip out of your hand spread it as you go and so carry it and lay it all over the Partridges If they lie stragling that one Net will not cover them draw out another and do in like manner and alike with a third if needs be Then rush in upon them and with an affrighting voice force them to spring up and presently they will be entangled in the Nets §. III. 3. How to take Partridges with Lime TAke of the largest and strongest Wheat-straws or for want thereof Rie-straws and cutting them off between knot and knot the lowest joynts are the strongest and best Lime them well over and coming to the Partridge-haunts after have called a little and find that you are answered prick down your straws round about you in rows as above directed for Lime-twigs not only cross the Land but the Furrows also taking in at least two or three Lands and that not very near but at a pretty distance from you yet so as to discern when any thing toucheth them Then lie close and call again not ceasing till you have drawn them towards you whither they cannot come but they must pass through the limed straws which they shall no sooner touch but they will be entangled and by reason they come flocking together like so many Chickens they will be so besmear and dawb one another that if there be twenty hardly one will escape This way of taking Partridge can only be used in Stubble-fields and that from August to Christmas If you would take them in Woods Pastures or Meadows with Lime you must use the ordinary Lime-rods before described and prick them down and order them in all points like as is directed for your Lime-straws §. IV. How to drive Partridges and Quails and take them in tunnelling Nets FIrst provide you a stalking Horse or an Engine made like a Horse or Oxe such as we have described Sect. 1. Chap. 4. Then go with your Nets to the Partridges haunts and having found the Covey pitch your Net in the secretest and likeliest place so as to drive them down the wind Lay not your Net flat on the ground but set it slopewise and so over-shadow it with boughs shrubs weeds or some other thing that groweth naturally on the ground it standeth on that nothing may perceive it till it be entangled Then having covered your face with some hood of green or dark blew stuff stalk with your Horse or Engine toward the Birds by gentle and slow steps and so raise them and drive them before you for it is their nature to run before a Horse or Beast out of fear lest it tread on them If they chance to run any by-way or contrary to what you would have them then presently cross them with your stalking Horse and they will soon recoil and run into any track that you would have them and at last into your Net The Net they use in Italy for this purpose is called Butrio or Cuculo and made with two wings and a tunnel stretcht with hoops See Figure
Chap from the root beyond the Nosthrils The Bridle of the mouth or the skin of the corners is also yellow The Nosthrils are round yet in one Bird of this kind we observed them long and bending It gaped wide It s Tongue was thick fleshy blunt as in the rest of this kind Being angry it opened its mouth and held its Tongue stretched out as far as the end of its Bill The roof of the mouth hath in it a hollow equal to the Tongue The Angle of the lower Chap is circular The Eyes are great the Irides or circles encompassing the Pupil white with a dash sometimes of yellow sometimes of red sometimes they are of a whitish colour without mixture of any other The lower Eye-lid downy The Membrane for Nictation blue The colour of all the upper part a dark fulvous approaching to black or a ferrugineous black In some birds of this kind we observed many white spots in the covert feathers of the Wings which in the Wings spread made a kind of white line The like white spots it had in the long feathers springing from the shoulders which cover the whole back The edges of these feathers were of a dirty yellow The lower side of the body was of a dilute yellow or yellowish white the breast stained with oblong ferrugineous spots not transversely placed but tending downwards in each feather drawn according to the length of the shaft The Chin is of a ferrugineous colour the shafts of the feathers being black Between the Eyes and Nosthrils grow long black bristles On the middle of the back grow no feathers but only down for the scapular feathers cover the whole back The flag-feathers in each Wing are about twenty four in number The outmost of which is shortest the third and fourth counting from it longest The tips of the four outmost are blacker and narrower than those of the rest For the tips of the rest are white The interiour webs of all are variegated with broad transverse dusky and whitish strakes or bars after the manner of those of a Woodpecker or Woodcock The under-side of the Wings excepting the tips of all the flags and the third part of the five outmost feathers is white varied with transverse parallel lines The Wings closed reach almost to the end of the Train The Train is nine or ten inches long made up of twelve feathers not forked but when spread term inating in a circular circumference The utmost tips of its feathers are of an ash-colour then follows a transverse black line of an inch breadth the remaining part being varie gated with black and cinereous transverse spaces or bars only the bottoms of the feathers white The Thighs are long strong and fleshy The Legs short thick and strong feathered down a little below the Knees The Legs and Feet yellow and covered with Scales The outmost toe joyned below to the middlemost by a membrane for some space The Talons strong long and black that of the outmost fore-toe the least that of the back-toe the biggest The Liver is divided into two lobes having a large Gall The Spleen of an Oval figure It hath but two Testicles The stomach is large not musculous but membranous that is not fleshy like the Gizzard of a Hen or Turkey c. but skinny like those of beasts It feeds not only upon Mice and Moles but also upon Birds For out of the stomach of one that we opened we took a small Bird entire and out of the stomach of another even a Thrush It is a great destroyer of Conies Yet for want of better food it will feed upon Beetles Earth-worms and other Insects The heads of these Birds are said to grow cinereous with age and the feathers of their backs white But whether it come to pass by reason of Sex or Age or other accident certain it is they differ very much one from another in this respect For whereas some have no white feathers neither in head back nor wings others have very many Buzzards Eggs are white stained with a few great reddish spots yet sometimes all over white without spots That sort of Hawk as Pliny witnesseth which the Romans named Buteo was by the Grecians called Triorches from the number of its stones Aldrovandus also saith that in a Buzzard dissected he had observed three stones The third stone appeared not to us though we diligently sought it Aldrovandus also himself saith that he would not very much contend with him that shall obstinately deny that third glandulous body which besides the two stones he had noted adjoyning to them to be a true Testicle §. III. The Honey-Buzzard FOr bigness it equals or exceeds the common Buzzard is also like it in figure or shape of body unless perchance it be somewhat longer It weighed thirty one ounces The length from Bill-point to Tail-end was twenty three Inches to the points of the Talons not more than nineteen It s breadth or the distance between the ends of the Wings spread fifty two Inches It s beak from the tip to the Angles of the mouth was an inch and half long black and very hooked bunching out between the nosthrils and the head The Basis of the upper Chap covered with a thick rugged black skin beyond the Nosthrils which are not exactly round but long and bending The mouth when gaping very wide and yellow The Angle of the lower Chap as in other Hawks semicircular The Irides of the Eyes of a lovely bright yellow or Saffron colour The head is ash-coloured The Crown flat broad narrow toward the Beak The bottoms of the Plumage in the head and back white which is worthy the noting because it is common with this to many other Hawks The back is of a ferrugineous colour or rather a Mouse-dun The tips of the flag-feathers as also those of the second and third rows in the wings white The Wings when closed reach not to the end of the tail The number of flags in each Wing twenty four The Tail consists of twelve feathers near a foot long variegated with transverse obscure and lucid or blackish and whitish spaces rings or bars The very tips of the feathers are white below the white is a cross black line under that a broad dun or ash-coloured space or bed the like whereto also crosses the wings which differ not much from the tail in colour As for the lower side of the body the feathers under the chin and tail are white the breast and belly also white spotted with black spots drawn downward from the head toward the tail The Legs are feathered down somewhat below the knee short strong yellow as are also the feet The Talons long strong sharp and black The Guts shorter than in the former The Appendices thick and short In the stomach and guts of that we dissected we found a huge
inches long A short Tongue wherein it differs from Woodpeckers blue Eyes short Wings which end a little beneath the rise of the Tail The Tail is almost three inches and an half long streight composed of seven or eight feathers The upper Legs are feathered the lower bare the skin being of a colour mingled of yellow and green of which colour are also the Feet In each foot it hath four Toes two standing forwards and two backwards both the inner Toes in each Foot as well the fore as the back one are but half so long as the outer The Claws are black The whole Head upper part of the Neck Back Wings and Tail above are of a green colour mingled with golden or igneous so that they shine wonderfully A ring of the same colour doth also encompass the Neck Under the Throat on the Breast the lower Belly and under the Tail it is of a dark yellow colour like yellow Way §. VIII * The Brasilian Curucui of Marggrave IT is a very elegant and beautiful bird almost of the bigness of a Pie Hath a short broadish Bill of a brimston colour A wide mouth and when open or a triangular figure Fair blue eyes with a golden circle I suppose he means encompassing the Pupil and under each Eye a spot of white skin like a Hen In the Eye-lids above and beneath black stiff hairs The Neck not long The Legs short and feathered almost to the Feet with black feathers It hath a Tail five inches and an half long of a good breadth Under the lower Bill in the middle and at both sides is as it were a beard made up of black bristles yet shining with a gloss of blue as in the Necks of Mallards Under the Throat the feathers are only black The whole Breast and lower Belly are of an excellent Vermilion colour The whole Back and upper side of the Tail are of a shining green with a gloss of blue and golden or igneous colour The end of the Tail hath a black border Underneath the Tail it hath white feathers elegantly straked with cross black lines The beginning of the Wings is of that shining green we mentioned The middle part is hoary the black feathers being poudered with very little grey specks as Mallards use to be The utmost part that is the longest feathers are of a dark dusky or blackish colour The Legs as I said are almost wholly cloathed with black feathers What is bare together with the Feet is of a dusky ash-colour The Toes are so disposed as the Parrots The feathers under the Wings are grey §. IX * Guira acangatara of the Brasilians Marggrav THis Bird is about the bigness of a Magpie It hath a Bill an inch long the upper Chap whereof is a little hooked the whole of a dark yellow The Eyes Crystalline with a dusky circle The Neck two inches long the body three The Tail very long viz. eight inches consisting of eight streight feathers The upper Legs are an inch and half long as also the lower The Toes in each foot four standing as in Parrots the two inward in each foot being shorter the two outward longer The whole Head is cloathed with feathers which in their middles longways near the shaft are dusky in their sides yellow as is the Crest The Neck and Wings on the other side have their feathers yellow in the middle and dusky in the sides The ends of the Wings are almost wholly dusky The whole Belly Back excepting the Wings upper Legs and rise or base of the Wings to three inches and an half length are covered with feathers of a pale yellow The end of the Tail hath white feathers the rest of the Tail is dusky The lower Legs and Feet are of a Sea-water-colour On the Head are long feathers erected like a Crest It makes a great cry in the Woods §. X. * The Brasilian Aracari of Marggrav the other Xochitenacatl of Nieremberg IT is of the bigness of a Woodpecker I suppose he means the common green one hath a Bill four inches long an inch and half broad or deep three inches and an half thick where thickest I suppose he means so much by measure round a little bending downward like a Turkish Scymitar and sharp-pointed like a Parrots the upper Chap being a little longer than the lower Both upper and lower are for above half way reckoning from the end serrate or toothed The upper part of the Bill is greater than the lower The Bill is hollow very light lighter than a Spunge The upper Chap white distinguished by a black line running along the middle or ridge from head to point the lower Chap wholly black The whole Bill is inserted into the Head triangle-wise and where the insertion is compassed about with a triangular white line It hath a Tongue four inches long very light and plainly resembling a feather to see to Or else is feathered and black if the Tongue may be said to have a feather It hath a Head not very big broad and compressed great Eyes with a black Pupil yellow Irides and the rest of the outsides of the Eyes black The Neck is not longer than a Parrots The body from the rise of the Neck to the Tail is about five inches long The Tail is broad like a Woodpeckers and six inches long or somewhat more The Legs and Feet are of a dark green or black like to those of Parrots having two fore-toes whereof the one longer than the other and two back-toes likewise of unequal length The Claws crooked and dusky or black The length of the upper Legs is two inches of the lower one and an half The whole Head and Neck as far as the beginning of the Breast are covered with black feathers which where they end are terminated in a circle The Breast and all the lower Belly elegantly cloathed with yellow feathers mingled with pavonine Cross the Breast from the one side to the other is a broad line drawn of a sanguine colour The whole Back Wings Tail and upper Legs are covered with dark green feathers or black with a gloss of green like the colour usual in our Magpies The end of the Back above the beginning of the Tail is of a sanguine colour to more than the Circumference of a Crown piece The Wings end at the rise of the Tail and within side are of a dark ash-colour The Bill is black within This Bird doth as it were pronounce its own name crying with a sharp voice but not very shril Aracari This Bird is very like the Toucan or Brasilian Pie The conformation of its Feet argues it to belong to the Woodpecker-kind We saw the Bill of this Bird in the Repository of the Royal Society London our selves also have one of them It is much less than the Toucans Bill not so compressed side-ways but rounder The upper Chap wholly white without any line of black in the top wherein it differs from the Aracari's Bill described
attentive and heedful would either have expected from those little Creatures or easily observed When I asked the Host whether their Tongues had been slit or they taught to speak any thing He answered no whether he had observed or did understand what they sung in the night He likewise denied that The same said the whole Family But I who could not sleep whole nights together did greedily and attentively hearken to the birds greatly indeed admiring their industry and contention One of the stories was concerning the Tapster or House-knight as they call them and his Wife who refused to follow him going into the Wars as he desired her For the Husband endeavoured to persuade his wife as far as I understand by those birds in hope of prey that she would leave her service in that Inn and go along with him into the Wars But she refusing to follow him did resolve either to stay at Ratisbone or go away to Nurenberg For there had been an earnest and long contention between them about this matter but as far as I understood no body being present besides and without the privity of the Master of the House and all this Dialogue the birds repeated And if by chance in their wrangling they cast forth any unseemly words and that ought rather to have been suppressed and kept secret the Birds as not knowing the difference between modest and immodest honest and filthy words did out with them This dispute and wrangling the Birds did often repeat in the night time as which as I guessed did most firmly stick in their memories and which they had well conned and thought upon The other was a History or Prediction of the War of the Emperour against the Protestants which was then imminent For as it were presaging or prophecying they seemed to chant forth the whole business as it afterwards fell out They did also with that story mingle what had been done before against the Duke of Brunswick But I suppose those Birds had all from the secret conferences of some Noblemen and Captains which as being in a public Inn might frequently have been had in that place where the Birds were kept These things as I said they did in the night especially after twelve of the clock when there was a deep silence repeat But in the day-time for the most part they were silent and seemed to do nothing but meditate upon and revolve with themselves what the Guests conferred together about either at Table or else as they walked I verily had never believed our Pliny writing so many wonderful things concerning these little Creatures had I not my self seen with my Eyes and heard them with my ears uttering such things as I have related Neither yet can I of a sudden write all or call to remembrance every particular that I have heard The Nightingale is very impatient of cold and therefore in Winter-time either hides it self in some lurking place or flies away into hot Countries Ireland as Boterus relates is altogether destitute of Nightingales which whether it be true or not I cannot tell In the South part of England in Summer time they are very frequent but in the North more rare Some build upon the ground at hedg-bottoms others in thick green bushes and shrubs They lay four or five Eggs. It is called in Italian Rossingnuolo from its red or fulvous colour or as Aldrovandus rather thinks from the diminutive Latine word Lusciniola In Italy among those little birds which growing fat in the Autumn are sold indiscriminately for Beccafico's the Nightingale is one It breeds in the Spring-time about the month of May building its Nest of the leaves of trees straws and moss It seldom sings near its Nest for fear of discovering it but for the most part about a stones cast distant It is proper to this Bird at his first coming saith Olina to occupy or seize upon one place as its Freehold into which it will not admit any other Nightingale but its Mate It haunts for the most part in cool or shady places where are little Rivulets of water such as are Quick-set hedges small groves and bushes where are no very high trees for it delights in no high trees except the Oak Additions to the History of the Nightingale out of Olina and others §. 1. The choice of the Nestlings and how to take and order them for singing MAke choice of such to bring up for singing as are bred earliest in the Spring because 1. They prove the best singers as having more time to con and practise their notes before Winter 2. They are easiest rear'd and become strong to endure the cold having mued their feathers before Autumn whereas the second brood muing them later are subject to be over-run with Vermine and often surprized and killed by the cold while they are bare of feathers 3. Such consequently prove more healthful and long-lived The young Nightingales saith Olina must be taken when they are well feathered saith a late English Author when they are indifferently well feathered not too little nor too much if too much they will be sullen and if too little if you keep them not very warm they will die with cold and then also they will be much longer in bringing up and together with the Nest put in the bottom of a little basket made of straw covering the Nest so that they cannot get out not tangle or double their Legs keeping them at first in a quiet place where few people resort feeding them eight or ten times a day with heart of a Veal or Weather raw well cleansed and freed from skin films sinews and fat cut into small pieces of the bigness of a writing Pen. Our English Author mingles a like quantity of white bread soaked in water and a little squeezed with the flesh chopping both small as if it were for minc'd meat giving to each bird upon a sticks end two or three small pieces of the quantity of a grey Pease at a time Make them drink two or three times a day by putting to them a little Cotton-wool dipt in water on the end of a stick Keeping them in this manner covered till they begin to find their feet and leap out of the Nest Then put them in a Cage with fresh straw fine moss or hay at the bottom lining the Pearches with green bays for they are very subject to the cramp at the first feeding and ordering them as before till you see they begin to feed themselves which you shall perceive by observing them pick the meat from the stick then take of the heart some pieces of the bigness of a nut and fasten them to the Cage sides When they are come to feed themselves give them four or five times a day a gobbet or two Let them have a cup of water very clean and bright changing the water in Summer-time twice a day doing the same by the flesh that it grow not sower nor stink When they are fully grown put
a Bill a palm long of a horny colour streight and sharp-pointed The upper Mandible was a little hooked at the end and longer than the nether with some blackness The crown was black The Neck ferrugineous two palms long The Back was black and so was the Tail which was very short the Rump beneath white The Wings partly ferrugineous partly white The Legs nine inches long The Iris of the Eyes was yellow This seemed as yet to be a young bird that had not mewed its first feathers §. XIV The greater speckled or red Heron of Aldrovand THis seems to be a bastard kind between the Bittour and the common Heron but to partake more of the common Heron whence it would be more rightly intituled The ash-coloured or blue Heron with red breast and sides In its bigness shape and serrate Claw it agrees with the common Heron. The crown of its Head is black adorned with a long Crest It s Back ash-coloured but darker than the common Herons On the shoulders grow long red bristly hairs The lesser covert-feathers of the inner side of the Leg are red The Thighs are white dashed with red Near the Breast on both sides is a broad red stroke The middle of the Throat is particoloured with black and pale red spots Down the sides of the Neck is a black line in the middle of two red ones The lower part of the Neck under the long feathers was of a deep red In other particulars it agreed with the common Heron. It had but one single blind-gut A huge Gall-bladder The Ribs tend streight downwards from the vertebres of the back like those of Quadrupeds The Guts are small and slender The remnant of the passage conveying the Yolk into the Guts is plainly to be seen in the form of a blind gut about the middle of the intestines the Pipe conveying Gall from the Gall-bladder to the gut and the porus bilarius do not concur in one common passage but continue their channels several and distinct and perforate the Gut in two places but near one to the other §. XV. * The Brasilian Soco of Marggrave IT is a Water-fowl of which here in Brasil many sorts may be observed It is of the bigness of the lesser Heron Hath a streight black and sharp-pointed Bill two inches and an half thick where it is thickest It s Head is like a Herons as is also its Neck being a foot long Its Eyes black with a golden circle The Wings and Tail are equally extended ending together For the Tail is short being not of above five inches length The Legs are sufficiently long above the knees four inches and as many below Each foot hath four Toes three standing forwards and one backwards The Thighs above the Knees are above half way bare of feathers covered with a dusky skin The Head and Neck are cloathed with brown feathers variegated with small specks Along the lower side of the Neck down as low as the Breast is a line drawn of white feathers mixt with black and brown ones The Back and Wings are indeed black but variegated or powdred with very small yellow specks or points The Belly is of the same colour with the Back Under the Wings are black feathers spotted with white §. XVI * The Brasilian Heron called Cocoi of Marggrave IT is an elegant bird of almost the bigness of a Stork Hath a streight sharp Bill about six inches long which is of a yellowish green at its rise Crystal Eyes with a golden circle the skin about the Eyes bare and ash-coloured The length of the Neck is fifteen inches of the Body ten of the Tail five The Tail and Wings equally extended The upper Legs are feathered half down being eight inches long the lower are but six and an half covered with an ash-coloured skin The Feet have four Toes disposed in the usual manner the middle the longest the rest shorter all armed with crooked dusky Claws The Throat and all the Neck are white The top of the Head and sides of a black colour mixt with cinereous It carries on the Head an elegant erect crest of the same colour from which two neat feathers hang down backwards of a black colour inclining to cinereous each five inches and an half long The foreside of the Neck is spotted longways or down its length with feathers mixt of black and cinereous In the lower part of the Neck before it hath long white fine delicate feathers hanging down which we were wont to wear in our Caps The whole Back Wings and Tail are of a pale ash-colour mingled with a little white The upper half of the Legs upper is invested with white feathers Along the length of the Back are extended fine elegant ash-coloured feathers for their figure and structure like those on the Neck It is good meat §. XVII * The Brasilian Heron with a serrate Bill of Marggrave IT is of the bigness of a tame Duck or a little bigger Hath a streight sharp Bill the fore-half as well above as beneath doubly serrate four inches and an half long It hath the Head and Neck of a Heron a black Pupil with a golden circle Its Neck is a foot long its body five inches and an half its Tail four wherewith the Wings end The whole Legs are nine inches and an half long The upper to the middle part only covered with feathers the lower half being bare In each Foot four Toes after the usual manner The upper Bill is dusky but toward the rise of a yellowish green The whole Head and upper side of the Neck are covered with long feathers of a pale yellow colour waved with black Under the Throat it is White The Neck beneath the Breast and lower Belly have white feathers waved with brown which brown is round about edged with yellow The whole Back and Wings are covered with dusky feathers waved with yellow The quil-feathers of the Wings are mixt of equal parts of black and green their tips being white The Tail consists of such feathers as the ends of the Wings but crossed with white lines The Legs and Feet are of a dark grey colour The Claws dusky It s flesh is eaten and tastes like that of other Herons §. XVIII * Guiratinga of the Brasilians called by the Portugues Garza that is a Heron. Marggrave IT is of the bigness of the Spoon-bills or Pelecan of Gesner and the same shape of body It walks erect with its long Neck and extended Bill which is streight sharp yellow four inches long the upper part thereof black the lower white It hath long Legs like a Heron of about six inches The Toes are after the usual manner The Legs outwardly as also the Feet are yellow inwardly mixt of green and dusky The whole body is covered with milk-white feathers On the neck are most elegant white feathers more fine than Ostriches It is a Water-fowl and its upper Legs are for some space bare of feathers §. XIX *
This Bird we saw at Milan in Italy and thus described It is something less than a Lapwing The upper surface of its body is grey of such a kind of colour as is seen in the Backs of Hen Ducks and Teal or of the Curlew Its Legs and Feet are long and yellow its Claws black It hath the back toe It s Bill is shorter than the Redshanks longer than the Lapwings near the Head of a flesh-colour near the tip black The prime feathers are twenty five in each Wing The Tail half a hand-breadth long not reaching so far as the ends of the Wings closed It hath the Head and Neck of a Tringa CHAP. VI. Of the Birds called Tringae §. I. The Tringa of Aldrovand The Cinclus of Bellonius The Gallinula rhodopus or phoenicopus and also the Ochropus media of Gesner The Steingallel of Leonard Baltner IN bigness it equals or exceeds a Blackbird The colour of the upper side is of a dusky green and shining like silk The feathers growing on and between the Shoulders as also the quil-feathers next the body and most of the covert-feathers of the Wings are spotted on the edges with many white specks Those on the top of the Head and upper side of the Neck want these spots N. B. That this Bird was a Female for in the Males there are many and thick set spots on the Head so that they make up certain lines or strakes The Circumference of the Eyes and the Chin are white The Throat is white and spotted with brown The feathers on the middle of the Back are blackish with white edges Those next the Tail milk-white The colour also of the Breast and whole Belly is purely white The Bill is an inch and half long streight slender compressed at the sides of a dark green black at the point The upper Mandible a little longer than the nether The Tongue sharp not cloven The Eyes of a greater size with hazel-coloured Irides The Legs are long lead-coloured with a tincture of green The Toes also long the two outmost connected by a membrane almost to the first joynt The back-toe little The Claws black This is a solitary bird yet in breeding time they fly two together Male and Female about the banks of Pools Lakes and Rivers The Gallinula rhodopus or phoenicopus of Gesner which he saith the Germans call Steingallel differs from the Steingallel of Baltner in the colour of the Legs which in Gesners Bird was like that of a Rose or Amethyst in Baltners a dirty green But seeing the other notes agree I judge it to be the same Bird different perchance in Sex since as Baltner hath observed in some of these Birds the Sexes differ in the colour of their feet §. II. * The third Tringa of Aldrovand called by the Italians Giaroncello Pinirolo THe Bill of this is much blacker than that of the precedent and a little shorter the upper Chap somewhat longer than the nether It is the same for shape of body only somewhat different in colours For whereas both are chiefly of a dusky and chesnut-colour in the Head Neck Back and Wings that in all these parts hath more of dusky this more of the other colour The Tail in like manner though it be something shorter is white underneath above approaches to the same chesnut colour In the Breast Belly Thighs Legs and Feet it differs little or nothing §. III. The lesser Tringa or Sandpiper An Cinclus secundus seu minor Aldrov Gallinula hypoleucos Gesneri Aldrov tom 3. pag. 469. Ein Psisterlein Leon. Baltner IT weighs near two ounces and is from Bill to Feet eight inches three quarters in length The middle of the Neck is ash-coloured else the whole upper surface of the body is of a dusky sordid green elegantly variegated with darker transverse lines only there is something of red mingled with the feathers on the middle of the Back and those that spring out of the Shoulders The Head is paler not varied with cross lines but black strokes drawn downward along the shafts of the feathers The Sides Breast and Belly are white Above the Eyes is a white line The Throat is of a sordid white the shafts of the feathers being darker The three or four quil-feathers next to the body are of the same colour with the body The outmost is dusky or dark brown the inner edge of the second about the middle of the feathers length hath a spot of white Of the rest to the tenth the inner Webs in order have larger white spots After the tenth the white spreadeth beyond the shaft into the other Web of the feather The tips also of the feathers from the fourteenth to the twentieth are white The primary covert-feathers of the Wings or those of the first row as well the upper as the nether have white tips Of the upper those especially from the tenth to the twentieth Of the nether those next the body which indeed are wholly white and not varied with lines The ridge or base of the Wing is white The feathers of the third row are white almost to the bottom But between the third row and the basis of the Wing is a broad line of brown The middle feathers of the Tail are of the same colour with the body The third on each side from the two middlemost have their tips white The fourth are more white Of the fifth all the exteriour Web is white and a little also of the interiour In the outmost the white spreads further into the interiour Web. The top of the Bill is of a dusky blackish colour the bottom whitish The tip a little bent downward The Eyes hazel-coloured The Ears great The Feet of a pale green The Claws black The outmost fore-toe joyned at bottom to the middle one by a membrane the back-toe small The Stomach less musculous than in granivorous birds in which dissected we found water-insects These are also solitary birds living singly except in breeding time when they fly together by pairs the Male and his Female I suppose this Bird is the same with that Gesner describes under the title of Pilvenckegen especially for that he saith it makes a noise by night like one crying or lamenting which thing as we have been informed is true of our bird Only it seems to be something lesser and of a darker colour above See Aldrovand tom 3. p. 485. They frequent Rivers and Pools of water I have seen of them about the River Tame in Warwickshire the Lake of Geneva c. CHAP. VII The Knot Canuti regis avis An Bellonii Callidrys nigra IT weighed four ounces and an half from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Feet was ten inches long between the ends of the Wings stretcht out twenty inches broad As for the colour the Head and Back were of a dusky ash-colour or dark grey The Rump varied with white and black lines The Breast and Belly white The sides
Pack-thread with large mashes at least two Inches from knot to knot For the bigger the mash so the birds cannot creep through the better The Net must not be above two fathoms deep and six long at the most A Net of that size being as great as a man is well able to throw over It must be verged with a strong cord on each side and extended stiff upon a long Pole at each end Then having observed the Morning and Evening-feeding of the Fowl which is seldom in one and the same place be sure to come two hours before those feeding times which are twilight in the Morning and after Sun-set at Night and upon these haunts spread your Nets smooth and flat staking down the two lower ends firm on the ground so that they may only come and go and no more The upper verge of the Net must stand extended on the long Cord the further end whereof must be staked down to the earth two or three fathoms from the Net the Stake standing in a right line with the lower edge of the Net the Fowler holding in his hand the other end which should be at least ten or twelve fathom long at its distance where he shall make some artificial shelter of grass sods earth or such like matter where he may lie out of sight of the Fowl Be sure that the Net lie so tickle that upon the least twitch it will rise from the earth and fly over Strow over the Net short dead fog and other grass to hide it as much as may be from the view of the Fowl It would be of advantage close to your Net to stake down a live Heron or other Fowl you spread for formerly taken for a stale making her now and then flutter her wings When you see a competent number of Fowl within the danger of your Net draw your Cord suddenly and cover them This you may do till the Sun be almost half an hour high but no longer for after that time no more Fowl will come to feed and at Evening from Sun-set till the Stars begin to appear Thus you may take not only the greater Water-fowl but Plover and others §. II. How to take whole-footed Water-fowl with Nets MAke your Nets of the smallest and strongest Pack-thread the Mashes of less compass than the forementioned let them be 2½ or 3 foot deep for length according to the Rivers and Waters they are to be pitched over Let them be lined on both sides with false Nets of strong Packthread every Mash being 1½ foot square that as the Fowl striketh either through or against them the smaller Net may pass through the great Mashes and so entangle them These Nets you shall pitch for the Evening-flight of Fowl before Sun-set and stake them fast down on each side the River the lower side of the Nets about half a foot within the water the upper side shoaling slantwise against the water yet not touching it by a foot and half at least The strings that support this upper side must be fastned to small yielding sticks prickt in the bark which as the Fowl striketh may give liberty to the Net to run and entangle them Yet one end ever made so fast that the Net may by no means be carried away You may thus place divers of these Nets over the River about twelve score one from another If there be any Fens Plashes or Pits at a good distance from the River go to them and shooting off a piece twice or thrice raise the Fowl from thence which will presently pack to the River then plant your Nets of the middle size upon the small Plashes and Pits and the longest of all upon the Fens In like manner if there be any covert of Sedge Reeds Rushes c. in the water pitch Nets about them also In the Morning go first to the River about an hour or two before day and see what your Nets have taken and unlade them Then if you find there be many Fowls upon the River shoot off your Gun in one or two places and that will quickly send them to the Fens Plashes and blank waters wither you may repair about Sun-rising and see what your Nets have taken there CHAP. II §. I. How to take Water-Fowl with limed strings AFter you have found and observed the haunts of the Fowl provide a long line made of small cord knotted here and there and well limed over and a burthen of little sticks sharp at the nether end and with a little fork at the upper If it be for the Evening-flight come to the place an hour before Sun-set if for the Morning at least two hours before day observe the same times in going to prick down Lime-rods and prick them down a little slanting so as they may be within a foot and half of the ground at the uttermost in even rows all over the place of haunt one row distant from another a yard or two and one stick from the next in the same row four or five yards Then lay the limed strings on the forks some rows higher than others like waves Fasten the ends with a slipping loop so that upon any violent strain the limed string may loosen and lap about any thing that toucheth it And so you shall take a great number of Plover of other Fowl that fly in a broad squadron and swoop close by the ground a good distance before they light In like manner you may take whole-footed Water-fowl liming your strings with strong and water-tried Lime placing the strings over the Water as you did over the Land only making your forked sticks so much the longer observing never to lay them in the Moon-shine but either in dark nights or shady places They may be placed either so near the water as almost to touch it or higher not exceeding a foot and half These birds though many times they fly in single files yet when they come down spread themselves so as to alight all as it were together upon the water And so by this Artifice they may be taken many together §. II. How to take Water-fowl with Lime-twigs YOu must provide good store of rods the best are small long streight twigs of Willow cut of even length less for small fowl and greater for greater yet all so light and slender as to be apt to play and wind about any thing The length must be suited to the place where they are to be used Smear above half their upper ends with Birdlime and holding them to the fire make the Bird-lime melt and run upon them that the Rod may not be discerned from the Lime Then at the times before directed go to the haunts And first in the very middle of the place pin down for a stale a live-fowl of the same kind you lay for yet so that she may have liberty of wing to flutter up and down at pleasure Round the Stale every way all the place over prick down your Lime-rods in rows at about
or stop into the fleshy part of it small pieces of Nux Vomica It is best to let these baits lie loose and not fasten them to the ground as some practise To take granivorous birds of the greater kind as Doves Rooks c. boil good store of Nux Vomica together with Wheat Barley Pease or any other Pulse very well in ordinary running water till the Grain be ready to burst then take it from the fire and cover it till it be throughly cold The Grain thus boiled and steept scatter thick where these Fowl frequent and it will have the like effect upon them as the Garbage or Carrion had upon the carnivorous For small birds boil your Nux Vomica with such seeds as they most delight in viz. Hemp-seed Rape-seed Lin-seed and above all Mustard-seed and they will be in like manner entoxicated Some instead of Nux Vomica take only the Lees of Wine which the sharper they are the better and in them boil and steep or only steep which is as availeable if continued a sufficient while their Grain or Seeds and scatter them as above directed Others take the juyce of Hemlock and steep in it their Grain or Seeds mixing therewith a pretty sprinkling of Henbane and Poppy seeds letting all stand in steep two or three days at least and then drain it and scatter it c. which will have the like effect with the Nux Vomica To recover any Fowl of these baits take a little quantity of Sallet-oyl according to the strength and bigness of the Fowl and drop it down its throat then chafe the head well with Vinegar and the Fowl will presently recover again and be as healthful and able as ever it was CHAP. V. Several ways of taking Partridges §. 4. How to take Partridges and other Birds with a Setting-dog A Setting-dog should be a lusty Land-Spaniel that will range well and yet at such absolute command that when he is in his full career one hem of his Master shall make him stand still gaze about him and look in his Masters face as it were expecting directions from him whether to proceed stand still or retire but the main thing he is to be taught is when he sees and is near his Prey of a sudden to stand still or fall down flat on his belly without making any noise or motion till his Master come to him For taking Partridge with him when you come into the fields where Partridges frequent cast off your Dog and let him range or hunt taking care that he range not too far from you but beat his ground justly and even without casting about and flying now here and now there and skipping many places which the mettle of many even good dogs will make them apt to do If he do so call him in with a hem and threaten him with a stern countenance and when he doth well encourage him When you see him make a sudden stop or stand still be sure he hath set the Fowl therefore presently make in to him and bid him go nearer if he refuses but either lies still or stands shaking of his tail and withal now and then looks back upon you he is near enough Then begin your range or circumference about both the Dog and Partridge not ceasing but walking about with a good round pace looking still before the Dogs nose to see how the Covey lies whether close together in a heap or scattering Then charging the Dog to lie still draw forth your Net and opening of it take you one end of the top-cord and your Companion the other and holding it stretcht run with the Net against the Dog and clap it down over the Birds covering Dog and all with it then make a noise to spring the Partridge that they may rise and be entangled in the Net Some observe to run with their Net against the wind to keep it fully extended One man may make a shift to do all But then he must peg down one end of his Net to the ground and taking the other end spread it over the Birds The Italians as Olina tells us are wont to purge their Dog before they go a Setting with him giving him a morsel made up of half an ounce of Agarick and two drachms of Sal gemmae mingled with honey of Roses covered over with Butter or some other unctuous matter that he may the more readily swallow it And the day following a broth made of a Weathers head boild so as with the flesh of it bread and a little Brimston pounded to make a sup He bids you also observe 1. Not to hunt your Dog especially after he hath been new purged till the Sun hath dried up the dew because else he will be apt to lose the sent and also hurt his feet 2. To begin to set on your Dog under the wind that he may take the sent the better The Net he saith ought to be a little longer than it is broad or deep viz. between seven and eight yards over and between eight and nine deep In this manner may be taken not only Partridges but Pheasants Moor-pouts and Quails §. I. Of the haunts of Partridges and how to find Partridges THe haunts wherein Partridges most delight and most constantly abide are Corn-fields especially during the time the Corn is standing under the Covert whereof they meet and breed After the Corn is cut down they still remain in the Stubbles especially Wheat-Stubbles both because they love to feed on that grain before all others and also for the height of the Stubble which affords them safer covert When the Wheat-stubble is either too scanty or too much soyled and trodden with Men and Cattel they leave it and go to the Barley-stubbles which though inferiour in both respects yet being fresh and not so usually trodden and beaten they take great delight therein In Winter when these stubbles are either plowed up or over-soyled with Cattel manure or the like then they resort to the enclosed grounds or upland-Meadows and lodge in the dead grass or fog under hedges among Mole-hills and under banks or at the roots of trees You may also find haunts of Partridges in small Coppices or Underwoods in Bushy Closes or where there grows Broom Brakes Furze or Ling or any other Covert Provided always that there be some Corn-fields adjoyning else they will rather avoid such places In Harvest-time when they can have no quiet lodging in the Corn-fields you may find them in the day-time in the Fallows adjoyning where they will lie lurking among the great clods and weeds and only early in the Morning and late at Evening fetch their food from the corn-sheaves next adjoyning Now for finding them some will do it by the eye like hare-finders viz. In taking their ranges over the stubble fields or other haunts casting their eyes on each hand they will espy them out though never so close couched which ability partly depends upon the goodness of the eye partly
The Fowler stalks with a Bell in his hand which he now and then rings With the same Net they also take Quails pitching just before the tunnel of the Net two Poles with five Cages hanging upon each having live Quails in them which serve to call and entice the wild ones Before the Nets they cast Millet or Panic seed to invite them in The drive them forward a man walks on each side the Net with a jingling Instrument Sonagliera in his hand first one then the other sounding from hand to hand The Net is to be pitcht three or four hours before day and the Birds driven early in the Morning If the Moon shines you may drive at any time of the night CHAP. VI. Several ways of taking Pheasants as §. I. With Nets PHeasants delight most in thick young well-grown Coppice Woods unfrequented and free from the footsteps and tracings of Men and Cattel not in tall high woods of timber-trees Having found their haunts and breeding places you may find their Eye or brood several ways as first by the eye searching up and down the haunts and bushes c. Secondly By coming early in the Morning or late in the Evening and observing the old Cock and Hens calling and the young birds answering them and by that sound guiding your self till you come as near as you can to the place where they meet lying down there so close that you may not be discerned and yet may exactly observe where they lodge and accordingly where and in what manner to pitch your Nets Thirdly Which is the most sure and easie way by an exact and natural Pheasant-call wherewith you must learn to imitate all the Pheasants several notes and tunes applying each to the right time and purpose when and for which she uses it whether it be to cluck the young ones together to brood them to call them to meat when she hath found it to chide them for stragling to call them together to rejoyce and wanton about her for all which she hath a several note The most convenient hours for the use of the Call are before or about Sun-rising and somewhat before Sun-set at which times they straggle abroad to seek their food and then your note is to call them to their food or give them liberty to range But if you will call them after Sun-rise or before Sun-set your notes must be to cluck them together to brood as also to chide them for stragling and put them in fear of danger The notes of rejoycing or playing are rather for finding the old Couples when they are separated Being come to the haunts you shall lodge your self in the most likely place for your purpose as close as possible and then begin to call first in a very low note lest the Pheasants be lodg'd near you and then a sudden loud note may affright them but if nothing reply raise your note by degrees to the highest pitch yet by no means overstraining it or making it speak untunably and if there be a Pheasant in the Wood within hearing of it she will presently answer and that in your own note and key If this call back be but from one single bird and come from far then you shall as secretly as you can creep nearer to it still plying your call and you shall find that the Pheasant that answereth will also come nearer to you The nearer you come the lower observe to make your Call speak as the Pheasant her self will do and her in all points you must imitate as near as you can and in the end you will get a sight of her either on the ground or on the boughs of some low tree as it were prying to find you Then ceasing your Call a while spread your Net as secretly and speedily as may be in the convenientest place between you and the Pheasant upon the lowest shrubs and bushes making one end fast to the ground and holding the other end by a long Line in your hand by which when any thing straineth it you may draw the Net close together or at least into a hollow compass Which done you shall call again and then as soon as you shall perceive the Pheasant to come just under your Net you shall rise and shew your self that by giving him an affright he may offer to mount and so be entangled in your Net If many answer your Call from several quarters of the Wood stir not at all but ply your Call and as they come nearer to you spread your Nets in the most convenient places round about you and when they are come under the Nets boldly discover your self to give the affright and make them mount §. II. Of the driving of Pheasants IT is only Pheasant-Pouts that can be thus taken Having found the eye of Pheasants by any the forementioned means you must then taking the wind with you for they will naturally run down the wind In the little pads and ways which you see they have made for they will make little tracks almost like sheeps tracks and as near as you can to some special haunt of theirs which you shall know by the barrenness of the ground mutings and loose feathers you shall find there place your Nets hollow loose and circular wise their nether part being fastned to the ground and upper lying hollow loose and bending so that when any thing rusheth to it it may fall and entangle it Which done you must go where before you found the haunt and there with your Call if the Eye be scattered call them together then taking your Instrument called a Driver made of good strong white Wands or Osiers set fast in a handle and in two or three places bound with cross Wands of the shape of those Wand-dressers which Cloth-workers use in dressing of Cloth therewith make a gentle noise upon the boughs and bushes which the Pouts hearing will presently run on a heap together from it a little way and then stand still and listen Give then another rack or two at which they will run again as before and thus by racking and striking you may drive them like so many sheep which way you please crossing them and racking as it were in their faces if they chance to go a wrong way till you have brought them all into your Nets In this driving be sure 1. To conceal your self from the sight of the Pheasants For if they perceive you they will instantly scatter and run one from another and hide themselves in holes and bottoms of bushes and not stir from thence upon any occasion as long as any day endureth And therefore it were not amiss to wear over your face a green hood and a Wreath of green leaves about your head and trim your Garments with branches and leaves of trees 2. To take time and leisure and not do any thing rashly For any thing done suddenly or rashly to these fearful Creatures breeds offence and amazement And a scare being taken though but by
almost to the end of the Tail The number of flag-feathers in each Wing is twenty four These are blacker than the rest of the feathers The outmost is above a hand-breadth shorter than that next to it The covert-feathers of the underside of the Wing are particoloured brown and fulvous The Tail is about nine Inches long made up of twelve feathers of equal length when it is spread terminated in a circular Circumference being particoloured of a dark and light fulvous or bay The Legs are about an hand-breadth long feathered down a little below the knee longer and slenderer for the bigness of the bird than in others of this kind The Legs and Feet yellow the Talons black The outer Toe in joyned to the middle by an intermediate Membrane reaching from the divarication up almost half way The Talon of the middle Toe is thinned on the inner side into an edge The Gall is large The blind Guts short and small The Stomach membranous in that we dissected full of the limbs of Birds and other flesh The Bird here described we suppose to be that called in England the More-buzzard common to be seen in Heaths and Wasts sitting upon small trees and shrubs With long slender yellow Legs The whole Body of a dark colour the interiour Remiges being paler or whitish and which is said to build in Fenny places I take this Bird to be the same with that Bellonius describes under the title of Circus as will appear to any one that shall compare the descriptions although Aldrovandus makes them to be distinct Species treating of them in several Chapters This Bird is sufficiently characterized by its uniform brown-bay or ferrugineous colour all the body over §. VII * The Brasilian Kite called Caracara and by the Portuguese Gaviaon Marggrav IT is a kind of Nisus of the bigness of a Kite hath a Tail nine Inches long The length of the Wings is fourteen Inches which yet do not reach to the end of the Tail The colour of the whole Plumage is tawny with white and yellow specks The Tail is particoloured of white and brown It hath a Hawks Head a hooked Bill of a moderate bigness and black colour It hath yellow Legs Hawks Feet semicircular long sharp black Talons It is very noisom to Hens I had saith he another of the same magnitude and colour with the precedent save that the breast and belly were white The Eyes of a gold colour and the skin about them yellow The Legs yellow For the bigness colour and preying upon Poultry we have subjoyned this to the Kites notwithstanding Marggravius maketh it a kind of Nisus or Sparrowhawk CHAP. IX Of long-winged Hawks used to be reclaimed for fowling §. I. Of the Peregrine Falcon. MR. Willughby having left no description of a Falcon and it having not been our hap since his decease to see any Hawk of that kind lest the Ornithology we set out should be defective and imperfect in this particular we have borrowed of Aldrovandus the descriptions of the several sorts of Falcons without omitting any We are not a little troubled that we cannot give any light to this Genus For we vehemently suspect that Species are here multiplied without necessity Aldrovandus assigns the first place to the Peregrine Falcon for its courage and generosity It took its name either from passing out of one Country into another or because it is not known where it builds its Nest having not been any where found Of this kind Belisarius makes two Species Carcanui four the difference being taken from the colour A Peregrine Falcon every way compleat must have these marks Broad and thick shoulders long Wings reaching to the end of the Train the Train long narrower by little and little and sharper toward the end like a Sparrow-hawks made up of large thick round feathers the tip not altogether white the shafts running along the middle of the feathers of a lovely red the Feet of the same colour with those of a Bittour viz. of a pale green or between a yellow and lead-colour the Toes slender the Talons large black and very sharp the colour of the Feet and Beak the same the Thighs long but the Legs short the Beak thick the Mouth wide the Nares large and open the Eye-brows high and great the Eyes great and deep sunk the Head arched the Crown being gently elevated and round As soon as it can fly it should shew certain little bristly feathers standing out as it were a beard Let the Neck be long the Breast broad and about the Shoulder-blades where it joyns to the Neck somewhat round Sitting upon the Fist it must bend its body a little backward being brisk mordacious and greedy Let its Eye-brows and Cheeks be white with a little mixture or dash of red The Eyes black encompassed with a Circle or Iris that is sometimes blue the Head ash-coloured like that of a Sacre The Back of somewhat a livid colour almost like that of a Goose covered with round and broad feathers The marks of the Wings agree to the second Peregrine Falcon of Belisarius which he makes to be of a Copper Aeneo colour For the first kind which he saith is blacker hath neither an ash-coloured Crown nor a yellow and hath its throat spotted with long direct black lines and its Thighs marked with transverse ones Its Legs also are of a Saffron colour but more dilute Aldrovandus describes a Bird of this kind taken in the Mountains of the Territory of Bononia in these words From the top of the Head to the end of the Tail it was seventeen Inches long The Crown of the head flat and compressed The Beak an Inch thick of a lovely sky-colour bending downward with a sharp hook short strong joyned to the head with a yellow Membrane of a deep colour which compasses the Nosthrils the Eye blue the edges of the Eye-lids round yellow The Head Neck Back Wings of a dark brown almost black sprinkled with black spots in almost every feather the great feathers being crossed with transverse ones The Throat was of a yellowish white the lower part thereof being stained with black spots as it were drops drawn out in length from the corners of the Mouth on each side a black line was drawn downwards almost to the middle of the Throat or Gullet The Breast Belly and Thighs white crossed with broad transverse black lines The tips of the Wings when closed reached almost to the end of the Train The Train less dusky marked also with black cross bars The Legs and Feet yellow the Thighs long the Shanks short the Toes slender long covered with scales as are also the Legs the Talons black and very sharp Aldrovandus thinketh this black Peregrine Falcon not to differ at all from the black Falcon simply so called or the Falconarius of the Germans
of care and toil broods feeds and cherishes the young Cuckow for her own until it be grown up and able to fly and shift for it self Which thing seems so strange monstrous and absurd that for my part I cannot sufficiently wonder there should be such an example in nature nor could I have ever been induced to believe that such a thing had been done by Natures instinct had I not with my own eyes seen it For Nature in other things is wont constantly to observe one and the same Law and Order agreeable to the highest reason and prudence Which in this case is that the Dams make Nests for themselves if need be sit upon their own Eggs and bring up their Young after they are hatcht What becomes of the Cuckow in the Winter-time whether hiding her self in hollow Trees or other holes and Caverns she lies torpid and at the return of the Spring revives again or rather at the approach of Winter being impatient of cold shifts place and departs into hot Countrys is not as yet to me certainly known Aldrovandus writes that it is by long observation found that she doth in the Winter enter into the hollows of trees or the Caverns of Rocks and the earth and there lie hid all that season Some saith he tell a story of a certain Country-man of Zurich in Switzerland who having laid a Log on the fire in Winter heard a Cuckow cry in it For being of a very tender nature and impatient of cold as Aristotle witnesseth no wonder if to avoid the Winter-cold it hide it self in holes especially seeing at that time it moults its feathers We also have heard of the like stories in England and have known some who have affirmed themselves in the middle of Winter in a more than usually mild and warm season to have heard the voice of the Cuckow But seeing it is most certain that many sorts of Birds do at certain Seasons of the year shift places and depart into other Countrys as for example Quails Woodcocks Fieldfares Storks c. Why may not Cuckows also do the same For my part I never yet met with any credible person that dared affirm that himself had found or seen a Cuckow in Winter-time taken out of a hollow tree or any other lurking-place Since the writing of this reading Jo. Faber his Expositions of the Pictures of some Mexican Animals of Nardi Antonio Recchi I find alleged the testimony of a credible person and an eye-witness one Theophilus Molitor a Friend of Fabers for this lurking of Cuckows in hollow trees Molitor affirmed this to have hapned at his Fathers house His Grandfathers Servants having stocked up in a certain Meadow some old dry rotten Willows and brought them home and cast the heads of two of them into the Furnace to heat the Stove heard as they were in the Stove a Cuckow singing three times Wondring at this cry of the Cuckow in the Winter-time out they go and drawing the heads of the Willows out of the Furnace in the one of them they observed something move wherefore taking an Axe they opened the hole and thrusting in their hands first they pluckt out nothing but meer feathers Afterward they got hold of a living Animal that was the very Cuckow and drew it out It was indeed brisk and lively but wholly naked and bare of feathers and without any Winter-provision of food which Cuckow the Boys kept two whole years in the Stove * Aldrovandus his first sort of Cuckow This differs in many respects from the precedent as first in that the transverse lines on the Breast are not continued but interrupted Secondly In that the covert-feathers of the Neck Back and Wings are almost all parti-coloured of black and ferrugineous Thirdly The Remiges elsewhere black in the middle and round the edges white Fourthly The Tail variegated with three colours black white and ferrugineous The black in each feather consists of two lines concurring in the middle of the feather in an acute angle and standing at equal distances in a certain Series or order to the end of the Tail The ferrugineous takes up the outsides of the intermediate spaces and the white the middle LIB I. PART I. SECT II. Of Nocturnal Rapacious Birds RApacious Nocturnal Birds are of two kinds viz. Eared or horned and such as want Ears To these we shall subjoyn the Goat-sucker which yet we believe not to be Rapacious but to have it self so to Owls as the Cuckow to Hawks Of Rapacious Nocturnal Birds we have in England four sorts besides the Goat-sucker 1. The Horn-Owl in Latine Otus or Asio so called from certain small feathers sticking out on the sides of the head in forms of Horns or Ears 2. The White-Owl called also the Church-Owl or Barn-Owl by Aldrovandus Aluco minor 3. The Brown Owl Screech-Owl or Ivy-Owl Strix Aldrovandi 4. The Grey Owl Strix cinerea CHAP. I. Of Rapacious Nocturnal Birds Horned or Eared §. I. * The great Horn-Owl or Eagle-Owl Bubo OF this Bird Aldrovandus gives us three figures and three descriptions which I suspect to be all of one and the same sort The first is taken out of Gesner the two last were composed by himself of his own observation The first they are Gesners words was as big or bigger than a Goose had great Wings two Feet and three inches long when extended in a right line from their beginning to the end of the longest feather from the top of the uppermost bone of the Wing to the lowest end was in a right line thirteen inches The Head both for shape and bigness was like a Cats for which reason the French do not improperly call it Chat huant q. felis gemebunda Above each Ear stuck out black feathers three inches high The Eyes were great The feathers about the Rump thick and very soft of more than a fingers length or an handful high if my memory fail me not From the point of the Bill to the end of the Feet or of the Tail for they were both equally extended it was two foot and seven inches long The Irides of the Eyes were of a deep shining yellow or Saffron-colour The Bill short black and hooked The feathers being put aside the Ear-holes came into sight which were great and open On both sides by the Nosthrils grew hair-like feathers as it were beards barbulae The colour of the feathers all over the body was various of whitish black and reddish spots The length of the Leg was thirteen inches The part above the knee thick and brawny The Claws black hooked and very sharp The Foot hairy or feathered down to the very Claws the feathers being of a pale red 2. The second saith Aldrovandus for bigness agreed exactly with this but differed in many other particulars For though its Feet were indeed hairy down to the Claws as in that yet shorter and slenderer neither so brawny above the knees nor so thick and strong-shanked The colour of the
colour partly distinguished with white Through the extreme parts of the Wings especially the prime feathers it hath broad transverse lines or bars of a Chesnut colour On the Belly it hath lines or spots of the same colour drawn longways but inverted the rest of the space or ground the Heralds call it the field being white The Wings when withdrawn and closed reach as far as the end of the Tail The Legs are feathered and rough down to the Feet of a colour compounded of cinereous and Chesnut The Toes are of a dark cinereous bare of feathers two standing each way The Claws black sharp and crooked * The Stone-Owl another sort of Noctua or perchance the same with the precedent This saith he which the Germans call Steinkutz that is Stone-Owl is also about the bigness of a Dove hath the Legs and Toes rough with white feathers but the lower sides of the Toes are bare the Claws black and hooked The colour all over the prone or nether side of the body was a dark brown with a sleight mixture of red dapled with whitish spots The Head in respect of the body very great The Eyes large The Bill short and like an Eagles In the dead bird the upper Chap of the Bill was red which seemed not to be so before while it was living Between the Eyes and the Bill grew certain stiff slender feathers like bristles or beards It had more white on the Belly than the other parts I suppose it lives and frequents chiefly in Mountainous and Rocky places and therefore to defend the cold hath its Feet and Toes feathered like the Lagopus and Grygallus For the other Noctuae have not their Feet rough neither are they of a reddish colour They seem to be less brisk and lively than our Italian Noctuae and almost blind in the day time §. VIII * The Brasilian Noctua called Cabure by Marggrav IT 's about the bigness of a Throstle hath a round Head a short hooked yellowish Bill two Nosthrils fair great round yellow Eyes with a black Pupil Under the Eyes and on each side the Bill it hath many long dusky hairs The Legs are short wholly cloathed with feathers yellow as are also the Feet which are cloven into four Toes standing after the usual manner armed with semicircular crooked sharp Talons The Tail broad nigh the rise whereof the Wings end In the Head Back Wings and Tail it is of a dilute Umber colour and variegated in the Head and Neck with very small in the Wings with greater white spots The Tail is waved with white The Breast and lower Belly are white and variegated with spots of a dilute Umber colour It is easily made tame It can so turn about its Neck that the tip of the Beak shall exactly point at the middle of the Back It plays with men like an Ape making many mowes and antic mimical faces and snapping with its Bill Besides it can set up feathers on the sides of its head that represent Horns or Ears It lives upon raw flesh CHAP. III. §. I. The Fern-Owl or Churn-Owl or Goat-sucker Caprimulgus IT s length from the Bill to the end of the Tail was between ten and eleven inches Its Head great but much lesser than in the Owl-kind Its Bill in proportion to its body the least of all birds and a little crooked It hath a huge wide mouth and swallow In palato appendices nullae sed primùm longa fissura fundo tenui ossiculo seu septo per medium diviso insra eam fissuram alia latior brevior ad hujus fundum linea appendicum transversa These words I do not well understand and therefore have not put them into English On the sides of the upper Chap of the Bill as also under the Chin it had stiff black hairs like bristles The under side of the body was painted with black and pale-red lines transverse but not continued The hinder part of the Head of an ash-colour the middle of each feather being black which colours also reach lower down the Back The Wings are particoloured of black and red The covert-feathers of the Wings are some of them powdred with cinereous The Tail near five inches long made up of ten feathers the outmost whereof are something shorter than the rest the middlemost ash-coloured with very narrow transverse black bars in the rest the cross bars are broader and the intermediate spaces of an ash-colour powdered with black and a little tinctured with red The Legs were very small in proportion feathered on the fore-side half way but the feathers hung down almost to the Toes The Toes were blackish and the Claws black and little the middlemost Toe the longest the inner and outer shorter but equal to one another and joyned to the middlemost by a Membrane from the divarication to the first joynt The interiour edge of the middle Claw is serrate as in Herons The back-Toe if it may be so called standing like one of the fore-toes is scarce a quarter of an inch long In the stomach it had some Seeds and Beetles The Eggs were long and white but a little clouded and spotted with black It is a very beautiful bird for colour more like to a Cuckow than an Owl and it is easily distinguished from all other birds by the structure of its Bill and Feet In another bird of this kind perchance differing only in Age or Sex the three first or outmost great Wing-feathers had a large white spot in their interiour Vanes which in the third feather reached also to the exteriour The tips also of the two outmost feathers of the Tail were spotted with white There was some shew of these spots of a pale yellowish colour in the first described It is found in the Mountainous Woods especially in many places of England as in York-shire Derby-shire Shrop-shire c. §. II. * The American Goat-sucker called Ibijau by the Brasilians Noitibo by the Portugues Marggrav THis is a small bird of the bigness of a Swallow Hath a broad flat Head Great lovely black Eyes with a black shining Pupil of an elliptical figure Outwardly a circle or ring of yellowish white compasses the Eyes It hath a very little Bill not exceeding the thickness of the tooth of a Shrew-mouse and not so long yet hath it patent Nosthrils in the Bill An exceeding wide Mouth which when shut cannot be seen but when she opens her Bill appears slit up to the Eyes so that it is almost an inch wide It hath a very little Tongue White Legs and small for the bigness of the body scarce half an inch long Four Toes in the Feet three standing forward and one backward armed with black crooked Claws Along the Claw of the middle Toe of each foot on the inside it hath as it were a fin much jagged or toothed so that the Claw seems feathered in a manner on the inside But there are no feathers on it
rest of the Tail-feathers is of a shining black The Feet and Claws are black The outmost Toe as in the rest of this kind is joyned to the middlemost at the bottom It hath a Gall its Guts were eighteen inches long The blind Guts half an inch The Testicles small It feeds on Nuts c. It hath a note or voice something like a Magpie We found this Bird in the Mountainous part of Austria near the way leading from Vienna to Venice not far from a great Village called Schadwyen where there is a very steep difficult and craggy ascent up the neighbouring Mountains whereupon there stand always ready there certain Yokes of Oxen to draw the Coaches or Waggons of such as travel that way up the craggy Cliffs and Rocks which Horses could not at all or with great difficulty climb and struggle through drawing a Coach after them §. VII * The Bohemian Chatterer Garrulus Bohemicus Aldrov eidem Ampelis IT is almost as big as a Blackbird but bigger than the Hawfinch It s length from Bill-point to tail-Tail-end nine inches Its breadth viz. the Wings being spread four Palms Whence it is manifest that Gesner is mistaken in that he writes that for shape and size of body and colours it approaches to the common Garrulus It s Bill is of a deep black of the bigness of a House-Sparrows Gesners figure represents it too long and too crooked The Nosthrils are encompassed with hairs of the same colour which make as it were a transverse black spot In which are included the Eyes that are round and of a most beautiful colour to wit Vermilion resembling that of the Chalcedonian Carbuncle commonly called the Granate Which perchance gave occasion to some to believe that they shine in the Night It s Head is after a sort compressed being by Gesner represented too round of a Chesnut or ferrugineous colour adorned with a crest or tuft bending backward after the manner of the crested Lark The colour of the Crest toward the Bill is a delayed Chesnut but backward cinereous inclining to dusky not unlike to the colour of Umber The Neck is short black in the fore and hind part red on the sides near the Bill white The Breast is of a chesnut or ferrugineous colour but dilute and inclining to rosie The whole Belly is ash-coloured except towards the vent where are some white feathers whose roots or lower parts v. g. from the middle to the flesh are black and softer than their upper parts The Back inclines to a chesnut or bay but toward the Rump it is cinereous or dun The outer feathers of the Wings are black the inner ash-coloured but declining to black The outer Wing-feathers are marked with spots very pleasant to behold Some of these feathers viz. the first seven in number are white their Appendices being red like to Cinnabar or Vermilion Gesner was told by a certain person I know not who but untruly that these feathers were horny I suppose he meant their shafts Yet are they pretty hard and solid long and after a sort Cartilagineous To these succeed other feathers adorned in like manner with spots but of a pale yellow resembling in some measure the figure of the Letter L Which are so disposed that in some feathers appear seven in some six and in some but five only Again the last feathers have white spots which by how much they are situate nearer the outside by so much do they become less conspicuous so that of the last feathers of all sometimes three sometimes two and sometimes only one is so spotted The covert feathers are also tipt with white Concerning the yellow spots it is to be noted that in the Females they are white and that over against them are to be found other white spots I have learned by inspection that the Tail of the Cock consists of ten feathers only the Tail of the Hen of twelve which near their roots are of a dark cinereous or Mouse dun but above are black The end of the whole Tail is yellow but more resplendent in the Male than in the Female Near the vent are some other feathers of a Chesnut-colour making as it were another Tail but far less The colour of the Legs is dusky inclining to blue The shape and bigness of the Feet answer to those of a Hawfinch The colour differs being black in the Garrulus flesh or rose-coloured in the Hawfinch It hath black and crooked Claws See the description of the Entrails and Bowels in Aldrovandus This Bird is said to be peculiar to Bohemia It feeds upon Fruit especially Grapes of which it is very greedy Wherefore it seems to me not without reason to be called by that name Ampelis It is a Bird of a very hot temperament and exceedingly voracious flies in companies and is easily tamed What else Aldrovandus hath of its disposition and manners food flight use c. See in his Ornithology It is wonderful and to me scarce credible what he saith he learned by ocular experience to wit that the Tail of the Cock is made up of ten feathers the Tail of the Hen of twelve CHAP. IV. Of Woodpeckers in general TO Woodpeckers if under this name we comprehend the Nuthatch the Wall-creeper the great Reed-Sparrow and the Ox-eye creeper there are very few notes common viz. to climb or run up trees sticking to their bodies or boughs and for that purpose to have strong and musculous thighs But if we exexclude the foresaid Birds and restrain the name to Woodspites properly so called there are many and remarkable notes whereby they may be distinguished from all other kinds of birds As for example 1. To have a streight hard strong angular and sharp Bill very fit and proper to pierce and bore holes in trees 2. A Tongue of a very great length round ending in a sharp stiff bony thorn dented on each side to strike Ants Cossi and other Insects withal This Tongue they can at pleasure put forth to a great length thrusting it deep into the crannies holes and clefts of trees to stab and draw out Insects lurking there 3. Short Legs but very strong 4. Toes standing two forwards and two backwards Which is common to these and Parrots Such a disposition of Toes as Aldrovandus rightly notes Nature or rather the Wisdom of the Creator hath granted to Woodpeckers because it is very convenient for the climbing of trees Their Toes also are close joyned together that they may more strongly and firmly lay hold on the tree they climb upon 5. All of them unless perchance you except the Wryneck have a hard stiff Tail bending also downwards and its feathers ends often broken and their shafts almost bare on which they lean and so bear up themselves in climbing Their Tail consists of but ten feathers 6. To feed only upon Insects 7. To want the blind Guts which is peculiar to this kind agreeing to no other bird or beast beside
the Peacock kind saith Aldrovandus To me it seems to be more like the Peacock than the common Cock in its bigness and stature or tallness in the manner of carrying its Tail but especially of setting it up and spreading it as if both it self admired it and took pride in shewing it to others That these birds were the Meleagrides of the Ancients as also their Gallinae Africanae Numidicae guttatae Aldrovandus takes much pains to prove In English they are called Turkeys because they are thought to have been first brought to us out of Turkey Turkeys love hot Countries yet they can bear cold ones well enough after they are grown up and have been used to them But their young Chickens are very nesh and tender and not to be reared without great care and attendance Their flesh is very white and delicate a dish becoming a Princes feast saith Aldrovandus if it be well concocted yielding a plentiful and firm nourishment of the same taste and quality with that of a Peacock and as difficult to concoct unless its hardness be before by some means corrected This is to be understood of old and well grown Turkeys for Turkey-pouts and young Turkeys are tender enough and of easie concoction The antipathy this Fowl hath against a red colour so as to be much moved and provoked at the sight thereof is very strange and admirable §. IV. The Brasilian Mitu or Mutu of Marggrave THis Bird saith Marggrave is of the Pheasant kind the Spaniards also as Nierembergius tells us call it a Pheasant But we partly for its bigness partly for its colour partly also for its gentle nature easily becoming tame but chiefly for that it spreads its Tail in like manner circularly think that it ought rather to be ranked with the Peacock and Turkey to which we have therefore subjoyned it It is bigger than the common Cock or Hen. The length of its body from the Neck to the rise of the Tail is ten inches The length of the Neck six inches It is all over covered with black feathers except on the Belly and under the Tail whereit is of a brown colour almost like that of a Partridge The feathers on the Head Neck and Breast are finer than the rest and for softness and beauty comparable to black Velvet On the top of the Head it hath black feathers complicated into a very low and flat cop which one that carelesly beheld the Bird would scarce take notice of but when it is angry or on other occasions it can erect them into a conspicuous crest It hath a remarkable Bill not thick crooked about an inch and half long The lower Chap is small the upper almost four times bigger The Bill is of a very bright carnation colour but toward the tip white Its Legs are like a Hens ten inches long to wit four from the Feet to the Knees and six above them where they are covered with black feathers It hath also four Toes like a Hens which from their rise to the first joynt are connected by an intervenient skin as in some other birds It hath a Tail a foot long like a Turkeys which it always moves in breadth crying Kit Kit like them A well-shaped Head like a Gooses a Neck about six inches long as was before said Brave great black Eyes and behind the Ears a white naked spot like a Hen. It is easily made tame it roosts willingly on high upon trees like Turkeys Finally it hath very good and savoury flesh The Pauxi of Nieremberg the Indian Hen of Aldrovandus lib. 4. cap. 12. a variety of the Mitu It was saith Nieremberg out of Fr. Hernandus of the bigness of a Dunghil-Cock or something bigger Its feathers were of a black colour but shining and almost like a Peacocks Its Bill red crooked and like a Parrots c. What was most remarkable in and peculiar to this Bird was a certain tumour fastened to the root of its Bill where it was more slender of the shape of a Pear of the hardness of a stone and of a blue colour like that of the stone called Cyaneus or the Turcois Aldrovandus describes his Indian Hen from a Picture as I suppose in this wise From the Bill to the end of the Tail which was white and striped with black lines it was black which blackness yet did every where incline to blue The vent and beginning of the Tail underneath were white It s Bill was strong crooked and red Its Legs were almost of the same colour but much paler and in their hind part inclining to blue The Claws were black It carried on its forehead a great protuberance of the shape of a Fig and of a bluish colour The Tail was long not erect as in our common Cocks and Hens but extended in length as in a Pie These birds differ not from the Mitu in any thing almost but that protuberance or excrescence at the beginning of the Bill Nierembergius also makes mention of this variety in his tenth Book Chap. 75. The Pauxi saith he for so he there calls this Bird hath a great head which in some is plain or smooth in others crested in others instead of a crest of feathers arises a stone or globular body a stone they call it though it be not over-hard like an Egg or bigger of the colour of Soder I wonder that Marggrave should make no mention of this bunch Surely it was wanting in all the birds he saw Whether this Bird be a Species distinct from the Mitu or only accidentally different we refer to further inquisition §. V. The other Indian Cock of Aldrovandus Mituporanga of Marggravius Tepetototl of Nierembergius THere is also found saith Marggrave another kind of this Bird which the Brasilians call Mituporanga differing only in the Bill and feathers of the Head This kind hath no long Bill but an indifferently thick one yet not so high as the Mitu nor so crooked The tip of both Chaps is black all the rest of the Bill covered with a Saffron-coloured skin the like whereto it hath also about the Eyes It hath goodly black Eyes The Head and Neck covered with feathers of a deep black like Velvet On the top of the Head it hath curled feathers twisted or turning up spirally as far as the beginning of the Neck which it can erect in the manner of a curled or frisled crest All the rest of the Bird is black wherewith is here and there mingled a gloss of green About the vent it hath white feathers The Legs are cinereous and of the figure of the Mitu's The Tail black but the extremities of its feathers white This Bird also easily becomes very tame and familiar Of this Bird Nierembergius writes thus The fawning and familiarity of Dogs doth not exceed the officiousness of the Tepetototl or Mountain Bird which others call Tecuecholi and the Spaniards Natives of America a Pheasant which is very tame and domestic It
is a bird of the bigness of a Goose of a black shining colour yet having some feathers white underneath about the Tail at the ends of the Wings ash-coloured Legs and Feet a crooked Bill partly cinereous and partly yellow and about its root as it were swelling out a folded or curled crest black Eyes but a pale Iris. It is fed with Corn made up into a mass or loaves and baked and with such like meat It s flesh is fat and good to eat and not unlike that of well-fed Turkeys It is a very gentle Creature and loving to man and begs its food when an hungry by catching hold of the cloths of those that it lives in the house with And when it hath occasion to go into any Room if the door be shut it knocks at it with its Bill If it can and be permitted it follows its Master and when he comes home receives him with great expression of joy and clapping its Wings Aldrovandus describes and sets forth the figure of this Bird under the title of Another Indian Cock The whole body saith he of this Bird was of a deep black It wanted both Spurs and Tail as also the Comb Instead of which it had on its Head curled feathers It s Bill was of two colours partly yellow to wit toward the Head partly black The upper Chap of its Bill hooked Where in other Cocks the holes of the Nosthrils are there this Bird had a certain yellow protuberance of the bigness of a Cherry The Legs and Feet were covered with whitish annulary scales Also some small feathers near the vent were white If this Bird be rightly described by Aldrovandus it seems so to differ from the Mituporanga of Marggrave as his Indian Hen above described doth from the Mitu viz. by the Cherry-like protuberance on its Bill Moreover it differs also in that it wants a Tail whereas the Mituporanga hath a sufficient long one But Aldrovandus saw not the bird it self but only its Picture which whether or no it were exact and not taken when the bird had lost its Tail there is some reason to doubt §. VI. The Guiny Hen. IT is for bigness equal to a common Hen But its Neck longer and slenderer The figure of its body almost like a Partridges It is of an ash-colour all over chequered with white spots A black ring compasses the Neck The Head is reddish On the Crown or top of the Head grows a hard horny cap a horn Mr. Willughby calls it of a dusky red colour The Cheeks beneath the Eyes are blue and bare of feathers under which is a red Gill. They say that these Birds are gregarious and feed their Chickens in common So far Mr. Willughby But because this description is very short and succinct though sufficient for the knowledge of the bird I shall present the Reader with a full and exact one out of Gesner The Mauritanian Cock is a very beautiful bird in bigness and shape of body Bill and Foot like a Pheasant Those that we have seen as also those described by Bellonius and Marggrave were as big as ordinary Hens armed with a horny Crown rising up into a point on the backside perpendicularly on the foreside with a gentle ascent or declivity Nature seems to have intended to fasten and bind it down to the lower part by three as it were Labels or slips proceeding from it between the Eye and the Ear on both sides one and in the middle of the forehead one all of the same colour with the Crown so that it sits on the head after the same manner as the Ducal Cap doth upon the head of the Duke of Venice if that side which now stands foremost were turned backward This Crown below is wrinkled round about Where it rises upright in the top of the Neck at the hinder part of the head grow certain erect hairs not feathers turned the contrary way The Eyes are wholly black as also the Eye-lids round about and the Eye-brows excepting a spot in the upper and hinder part of each Eye-brow The bottom of the Head on both sides all along is taken up by a kind of callous flesh of a sanguine colour which that it might not hang down like Gills or Wattles Nature hath taken care to turn backward and fold up so that it ends in two acute processes From this flesh arise up on both sides certain Caruncles wherewith the Nosthrils are invested round and the Head in the forepart separated from the Bill which is pale-coloured of these also at the Bill the lower edges are lightly reflected back under both Nosthrils What is between the Crown and this flesh on the right and left side is marked with a double scaly incisure but behind with none It s colour under the Jaws or Throat is exactly purple in the Neck a dark purple In the rest of the body such as would arise from black and white fine powder sprinkled or sifted thin upon a dusky colour but not mingled therewith In this colour are dispersed and thick-set all over the body oval or round white spots above lesser below greater comprehended in the intervals of lines obliquely intersecting one another as is seen in the natural position of the feathers in the upper part of the body only not in the lower I suppose he means if we should fancy lines to be drawn in the manner of Network all over the back the spots would stand in the middle of the Meishes of that Network This you may find to be so not only from viewing the whole body but even single feathers plucked off For the upper feathers in oblique lines intersecting one another or if you please certain circumferences made as I said of black and white powder and having their extremities joyned together as in Honey-combs or Nets do comprehend oval or round spots in dusky spaces but so do not the lower Yet both are placed in a like manner For in some feathers they are so joyned together in order that they do almost make acute triangles in others so as to represent an oval figure Of this kind there are three or four rows in each single feather so that the lesser are contained within the greater In the end of the Wings and in the Tail the spots stand in equidistant right lines long ways of the feather Between the Cock and Hen you can scarce discern the similitude is so great save that the Head of the Hen is all black It s voice is a divided or interrupted whistle not louder nor greater than that of a Quail but liker to that of a Partridge except that it is higher and not so clear This description was sent to Gesner by our Dr. Key Cajus Marggravius saw others brought out of Sierra Lyona like to the above described whose Neck was bound or lapped about with as it were a membranous cloth of a blue ash-colour A round many-double tuft or crest consisting
her young ones with Misselto berries and nothing else as I could perceive having diligently watched them for two or three hours together This I can hardly believe for that the old ones feed upon other berries too and also Insects For Convulsions or the Falling sickness kill this bird dry him to a powder and take the quantity of a penny weight every morning in six spoonfuls of black Cherry water or the distilled water of Miselto-berries The reason of this conceit is because this bird feeds upon Misselto which is an approved remedy for the Epilepsie §. II. The Mavis Throstle or Song-thrush Turdus simpliciter dictus seu viscivorus minor IT is called viscivorous not because its feeds upon Misselto-berries but because it is like the Missel-bird It is lesser than the Fieldfare scarce bigger than the Redwing of three ounces weight from the point of the Bill to the end of the Tail or the Feet for all is one nine inches long The Bill is an inch long of a dusky colour The Tongue viewing it attentively appears to be a little cloven The Mouth withinside is yellow The Irides of the Eyes hazel-coloured In the colour and spots of the Breast and Belly it agrees with the Missel-bird For the spots are dusky the Breast yellowish the Belly white The upper surface of the body is all over dusky with a mixture of yellow in the Wings I should rather call this an Olive-colour from its likeness to that of unripe pickled Olives such as are brought over to us out of Spain This Bird for its outward shape and colour is so like the Redwing that they are hard to be distinguished Only this hath more and greater spots on the Breast and Belly Aldrovandus tells us that it is proper to this kind to be spotted about the Eyes The lesser feathers covering the Wings underneath are of a yellowish red colour The lower covert-feathers have yellow tips The quill-feathers in each Wing are in number eighteen The Tail is three inches and an half long and made up of twelve feathers The Legs and Feet are of a light brown or dusky The soals of the Feet yellow The exteriour toe grows to the middle one as far as the first joynt It hath a Gall-bladder the Stomach or Gizzard not so thick and fleshy as in other birds of this Tribe It s feeding is rather upon Insects than berries It eats also shell-snails which are by most Naturalists reckoned among Insects The Sex cannot be known by the colour It abides all the year and breeds with us in England It builds its Nest outwardly of earth moss and straws and within dawbs it with clay laying its Eggs and Young upon the bare clay it lays at one sitting five or six Eggs of a bluish green colour speckled with a few small black spots thin-set In the Spring time it sits upon trees and sings most sweetly It is a solitary bird like the Shrite But it builds rather in hedges than high trees Moreover it is a silly bird and easily taken For the delicate taste of its flesh it is by all highly and deservedly commended If we stand to Martials judgment the Thrush is the best meat of all birds Inter aves Turdus siquid me judice verum est Inter quadrupedes gloria prima lepus This saith a late English Writer is a rare Song-bird as well for the great variety of his notes as his long continuance in song at least nine months in the year They breed commonly thrice a year in April May and June but the first birds prove usually the best They may be taken in the Nest at fourteen days old or sooner must be kept warm and neat not suffering them to sit upon their dung if it happen to fall into the Nest When they are young you must feed them with raw meat and some bread mixt and chopt together with some bruised Hemp wet their bread and mix it with their meat When they are well feathered put them in a large Cage with two or three Perches in it and dry Moss at the bottom and by degrees you may give them no flesh at all but only bread and hemp-seed Give them fresh water twice a Week to bathe themselves otherwise they will not thrive If he be not clean kept he is subject to the Cramp like other singing birds §. III. The Fieldfare Turdus pilaris IT weighs well nigh four ounces It s length from the point of the Bill to the end of the Tail or utmost Claws for they are equally extended is ten inches and an half Its breadth the Wings being spread seventeen The Bill is an inch long like a Blackbirds yellow save the tip which is black The Bills of the Hens or young birds are darker and less yellow as in Blackbirds the Tongue is rough horny channel'd in the middle The edges of the Eye-lids being yellow make a yellow circle round the Eye The Nosthrils are great In the lower part of the nictating membrane is a black spot The Ears are large The Feet black but the Claws more The outer Toe is joyned immediately to the middle one as far as the first joynt It seems to be somewhat bigger than a Blackbird and the second in bigness of this kind or next to the Missel-bird The Head Neck and Rump are ash-coloured in some of a deep blue The crown of the Head sprinkled with black spots which yet in some birds are wanting The Back Shoulders and covert feathers of the Wings are of a dark red or Chesnut-colour the middle parts of the feathers being black The Throat and upper part of the Breast are yellow spotted with black the black spots taking up the middle parts of the feathers The bottom of the Breast and Belly are white and less spotted The covert-feathers of the sides under the ends of the Wings are white Thence a red or yellow line separates the white from the black On each Cheek it hath a black stroak reaching from the Bill to the Eyes It hath also on both sides at the bottom of the Neck just by the setting on of the Wings a black spot The number of quil-feathers as in the rest is eighteen the outmost of which are black with white edges the inner have something of red The covert-feathers of the inside of the Wings are white The Tail is four inches and an half long composed of twelve feathers of a dark blue or blackish colour Only the tips of the outmost feathers are white and the edges of the middlemost ash-coloured The Liver is divided into two Lobes and furnished with its Gall-bladder The Muscles of the Gizzard are not very thick I found no footstep of the passage for conveying the Gall into the Guts These Birds fly in flocks together with Stares and Redwings They shift places according to the seasons of the year About the beginning of Autumn come over incredible flights of them into England which stay with us all Winter and in the Spring fly all
good way and toward the tip moderately hooked The Claws also are whitish §. X. The Bird called Spipoletta at Florence Tordino at Venice Perchance the Stopparola or Grisola or Spipola secunda of Aldrovand IT is less than a Lark about the bigness of a Beccafigo From Bill point to Tail end 7⅛ inches long Between the tips of the Wings extended eleven three quarters broad It s Bill is small slender about half an inch long streight sharp and cole-black Its Spur or back-claw very long like a Larks It s colour on the top of the Head Neck Shoulders and Back cinereous with a dash of green Mr. Willughby makes the Back to be of an obscure or dusky yellow the Head more cinereous The Breast and Belly are white The Throat spotted The Belly of the Hen-bird is yellowish The Throat Breast and Belly in some are white in others of a lovely yellow But in all generally the Breast is darker than the Throat or Belly and spotted It hath in each Wing eighteen prime feathers I found not in this kind that small short outmost feather which we have observed in the Wings of many small birds of a dark or dusky colour excepting the outer edges which are either whitish or yellowish The feathers also of the second row are of the same colour with those of the first The Tail is about three inches long and consists of ten feathers of which the two outmost on each side have their outward Vanes and tops in the whole above their halves milk-white all the rest are dark-coloured and almost black especially in the Males excepting the two middlemost which round the edges are either yellowish or white Mr. Willughby describes the Tail a little otherwise and perchance more exactly thus The Tail is black but the upper half of the outmost feather on each side and the tip of the next are white the two middlemost from dusky incline to an ash-colour This bird is sufficiently distinguished by the length of its heel from other sorts of birds by the black colour of its Wings and Tail Bill and Feet from other Larks Concerning its manners place nest breeding c. we have nothing further to add We saw it at Venice and Florence in the hands of Country-men and Fowlers among other small birds to be sold in the Markets At Florence they called it Spipoletta whence induced by the agreement of names we guess it to be either the first or second Spipola of Aldrovandus But yet seeing in the descriptions of these birds there is no mention made of the length of the heel which it is not likely so curious a spectatour as Aldrovand should either oversee or through neglect and forgetfulness omit notwithstanding the convenience of names these may perchance be distinct Species And therefore that we may not give the Reader just occasion to to complain that we have rashly omitted any thing in our Ornithology we will annex to this Chapter Aldrovandus his descriptions of Spipolae Stopparolae and other small birds to which we judge this to be the same or very like The first Spipola of Aldrovandus The first Spipola which is greater than the rest in this kind hath an ash-coloured Head Under the Bill a white spot in place of a beard It s Breast is red Its Belly particoloured of red and white Its Tail black above white underneath It s Back ash-coloured Its Wings particoloured of white black and red its Legs and Feet yellow its Claws black Its Bill long slender and dusky coloured This bird if it be exactly described is to us as yet unknown The other Spipola of Aldrovandus This inclines more to an ash-colour than the precedent But differs from it in that it hath not a red Brest but marked with black spots drawn downwards It is also more cinereous above than beneath Moreover the Belly is almost white Behind the Eyes is a great spot approaching after a sort to a ferrugineous colour The master feathers of the Wings and those which cover them are black their sides and ends being cinereous The Legs and Feet are dusky The Tail ash-coloured The third Spipola of Aldrovandus described in the same Chapter This some call Boarina It is a small bird almost all over of a pale or whitish yellow but deeper in the Wings than elsewhere The Bill and Feet are dusky The Stopparola of Aldrovand lib. 17. cap. 27. The Fowlers saith he of our City call this bird Stopparola a name I know not what it signifies nor whence it is derived unless perchance it be from Stubble which our Country men call Stoppia It is if I be not mistaken of the Genus of the Muscicapae hath the Breast and Belly for the most part white the Head which on the Crown is speckled with white spots Neck Back and Tail brown the quill-feathers of the Wings black as are also the coverts but yellowish on the sides The Legs and Feet slender and black The Bill indifferently long sharp-pointed and black A Bird like to Stopparola Magnanina Aldrov in the same place It is of the bigness of a Wagtail hath a long streight sharp Bill yet above having a little declivity black above and of a horn colour underneath The Neck Breast and Belly pale The Eyes small and lively having a black Pupil and a white circle and a dusky spot hardly conspicuous about them The Feet leadencoloured The Grisola of Aldrovandus There is a certain other small bird caught in our fields which the Fowlers call Grisola perchance from its grey or hoary colour although it be not grey but of a dusky ash-colour Or perchance because it cries much keeping alone for we sometimes use the word gridare to signifie lamenting It feeds upon flies and other such like Insects as I gather from the figure and construction of its Bill for it is slender streight and long On the Neck and Breast it is distinguished with oblong brown spots tending downwards The whole Belly is white The Head upper side of the Neck Back and Tail are dusky as are also the Wings the feathers whereof have their sides and ends of a pale ash-colour The Legs and Feet are also dusky or blackish The Glareana or Grien Vogelin of Gesner Hither also for its spotted Breast we will refer the Glareana or Grien Vogelin of Gesner which because the Author described from the inspection of a Picture sent him from Strasburgh we suspect not to differ from the above described although in some particulars it seems to vary We refer the Reader that desires more concerning it to Gesner or Aldrovandus CHAP. II. Of the Swallow in general THe characteristic notes of Swallows are a great Head a short Neck a small short Bill a wide mouth for the more easie catching of Flies and other Insects as they flie to and fro Very long Wings a swift and almost continual flight a long and forked Tail for the more ready and speedy turning their body
and directing their flight White Eggs speckled with ferrugineous spots as Aldrovandus truly observed This bird is the Springs Herald being not seen throughout all Europe in Winter-time Whence that Greek Proverb common to almost all Languages 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One Swallow makes not a Spring We have observed four sorts of Swallows in England and not more elsewhere Those are 1. The common or House-Swallow 2. The Martin or Martinet or Martlet 3. The Sand-Martin or Shore-bird 4. The black Martin or Swift Of this last we have seen a sort painted with the whole Belly white And Julius Scaliger affirms that he hath seen one of this kind as big as a Buzzard No way differing in shape from the common one save in the Legs and Talons and hookedness of the Beak all fitted for prey As for the Physical vertues and faculties of Swallows and their parts Schroder hath thus briefly summed them up 1. Swallows entire are a specific remedy for the Falling sickness dimness of sight blear eyes their ashes mingled with honey and so applied they cure also the Squinancy and inflammation of the Uvula being eaten or their ashes taken inwardly 2. A Swallows heart is also said to be good for the Falling sickness and to strengthen the memory Some eat it against the Quartan Ague 3. Some will have the bloud to be a specific for the Eyes And they prefer that which is drawn from under the left Wing 4. There is a Stone found sometimes though seldom in the stomach of some of the young Swallows called Chelidonius of the bigness of a Lentile or Pease This they will have to help the Falling sickness in Children bound to the arm or hung about the neck Note They report this stone to be found especially in the increase of the Moon and in the first hatch'd yong one Others take it out in August about the Full of the Moon 5. The Nest outwardly applied gives relief in the Squinancy Heals the redness of the Eyes and is good for the biting of an Adder or Viper 6. The Dung heats very much discusses and is acrimonious It s chief use is against the bitings of a mad dog taken outwardly and inwardly in Colic and Nephritic pains taken inwardly put up it provokes excretion Schrod An approved Medicine for the Falling sickness Take one hundred Swallows I suppose here is some mistake and that one quarter of this number may suffice one ounce of Castoreum one ounce of Peiony roots so much White-Wine as shall suffice Distill all together and give the Patient to drink three drachms fasting every Morning This will lessen every fit and perfectly cure them Purge often as the strength of the Patient will bear with Stibium CHAP. III. Of Swallows in particular §. I. The common or House-Swallow Hirundo domestica THe Female weighed scarce an ounce From the Bill to the end of the Tail being seven inches long and measuring from tip to tip of the Wings extended twelve and an half broad It s Bill was short black flat and depressed very broad at the Head but sharp-pointed black also on the inside But the Tongue and roof of the mouth yellow The aperture of the mouth gaping very wide for the conveniency of catching Flies and Gnats as she flies The Tongue short broad and cloven The Eyes great and furnished with nictating membranes The Irides hazel-coloured The Feet short and black the outmost toe growing to the middlemost at bottom The Head Neck Back and Rump are of a very lovely shining but dark purplish blue colour As well above as underneath the Bill that is to say in the Forehead and under the chin is a deep sanguine spot But that underneath is much the bigger The Throat is of the same colour with the Neck The Breast and belly white with a dash of red as are also the interiour covert-feathers of the Wings The Tail is forked consisting of twelve feathers the outmost of which are an inch longer than the next and end in sharp points Of the rest the interiour are also shorter in order than the exteriour but the difference much less All these feathers of the Tail except the two middlemost are black and each adorned with a white spot Which spots cross the Tail in a streight line The two middlemost want the white spot The Wings have eighteen quill-feathers alike black But all the covert feathers are of a deep shining blue In the Stomach of an old bird we found Beetles in the stomachs of the young many small pellucid unequal stones tinctured with a fair Claret colour not far from the Eggs small worms spirally rolled up of three inches length These birds build in Chimneys About the end of September we saw great numbers of them to be sold in the Market at Valentia in Spain when we travelled through that Country Anno 1664. What becomes of Swallows in Winter time whether they fly into other Countries or lie torpid in hollow trees and the like places neither are natural Historians agreed nor indeed can we certainly determine To us it seems more probable that they fly away into hot Countries viz. Egypt Aethiopia c. then that either they lurk in hollow trees or holes of Rocks and ancient buildings or lie in water under the Ice in Northern Countries as Olaus Magnus reports For as Herodotus witnesseth they abide all the year in Egypt understand it of those that are bred there saith Aldrovandus for those that are bred with us only fly thither to winter I am assured of my own knowledge saith Peter Martyr that Swallows Kites and other Fowl fly over Sea out of Europe to Alexandria to winter Swallows sometimes vary in colour as do also many other birds I have saith Aldrovandus often seen House Swallows all over white If any one desires to have white Swallows let him anoint their Eggs while they sit with oyl-olive Aldrov §. II. The Martin or Martinet or Martlet Hirundo agrestis sive rustica Plinii THis being measured from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail was six inches long The Wings being spread ten inches and an half broad It s Head flat Its Bill also very much depressed and flat as in the House-Swallow at its insertion into the Head ⅜ of an inch broad but sharp at the point From the tip to the angles of the Mouth but half an inch long the upper Chap somewhat longer than the nether The Mouth is yellow withinside The Tongue cloven The Circles encompassing the Pupils of the Eyes of a havel-colour The Feet small and Legs short The soal of the foot bare in which appear the bottoms of the exteriour Toes joyned by a membrane The Claws are white The Feet to the very Claws covered with a white Down By which note it is easily distinguishable from all its fellows of the Swallowkind It s Head Neck Back Tail and Wings are of the same colour with the House-Swallows but sadder and not so glossie
The edges of it on both sides are yellow the whole is environed with a black line The sides of the Neck are of a lovely shining yellowish green colour The Eyes are encompassed with white The Neck and all the Back from a dark green incline to yellow The Breast is of a sordid white In the bird that I J. R. described the Breast and Belly were dashed with a faint green The Wings were concave not much unlike to a Chassinches Wings The quil-feathers of the Wings as in almost all small birds were eighteen all of a dusky colour only their exteriour edges yellowish and their interiour whitish The tips also of the three next to the body were white But what was most especially notable in the Wings of this bird was that the middle quill-feathers or indeed all excluding the five outmost and the three inmost had their exteriour Webs as far as they appear above the covert feathers to a considerable breadth black so that when the Wings are shut they make a black spot of a good bigness about the middle of each Wing The outmost quil-feather was very short and little The covert-feathers of the first row have white tips all together making a white line across the Wing Above also towards the ridge of the Wing is a white spot The Tail is made up of twelve sharp-pointed feathers an inch and half long not forcipate of a dusky colour only the exteriour borders of the feathers are of a yellowish green The Bill is slender streight black half an inch long The feet yellowish and the Claws of a not much different colour The Tongue long sharp and cloven The Irides of the Eyes of a hazel colour The stomach small musculous and full of Insects whence it is manifest as Aristotle rightly saith that it is a vermivorousbird The Female as in most other birds hath not so fair colours We saw of these birds first to be sold in the Market at Nurenberg Afterwards our worthy Friend Mr. Fr. Jessop of Broomhall in Sheffield Parish whom we have occasion often to mention in this Work sent us of them which he had found and caught in the Mountainous Woods about Highloe near Hathersedge in the Peak of Derbyshire The same also found them here in Middleton Park in Warwickshire where he shot them and brought them to us They abide and haunt for the most part on the tops of trees especially Oaks What is spoken of the antipathy and feud between this bird and the Eagle we look upon as an Old Wives Fable Aldrovandus writes that she lays six or seven Eggs together before she sits not bigger than Pease CHAP. XII A little yellowish Bird without name called by Aldrovandus Regulus non cristatus perchance the Asilus of Bellonius or the Luteola of Turner THis is equal to or somewhat bigger than the crested Wren weighs two drachms being in length from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail or which is all one the end of the Claws five inches in breadth between the extremities of the Wings extended seven All its upper side save the Wings and Tail is of a dusky or cinereous colour tinctured with green The Rump is greener than the rest of the Back A yellowish line is produced from the Nosthrils above the Eyes almost to the hinder part of the Head The nether side viz. the Throat Breast and Belly is white with a dash of green and sometimes yellow The Wing and Tail-feathers are dusky having their outer edges green The feathers under the bastard-wing and the coverts of the underside of the Wings from green decline to a lovely yellow Each Wing hath eighteen prime feathers the outmost of which is very short and small The Tail is two inches long not forked made up of twelve sharp-pointed feathers It s Bill is slender streight sharp half an inch long the upper Mandible being dusky on the outside but the angles of the Mouth are yellowish The mouth within yellow The Nosthrils are large The Legs and Feet small of a dusky Amber colour The outmost fore-toe at bottom grows to the middle one It s Gizzard is small It sings like a Grashopper and doth much frequent Willow-trees It is much in motion continually creeping up and down trees and shrubs and sings with a querulous note It builds its Nest of moss and straws and a few feathers and hairs within It lays five Eggs all over besprinkled with red specks The birds of this kind vary in colour some being of a paler some of a deeper green or yellow in some the Belly is white without any tincture of green Mr. Jessop set us a bird in all points exactly like that here described and whose note also resembled the noise of a Grashopper but twice as big Now that the Reader may judge whether the Asilus of Bellonius be the same with this bird as we suppose we will subjoyn Bellonius his description thereof The Asilus saith he is of all birds the least except the Regulus and Tyrannus that is according to him the common Wren and the crested Wren at least there is none less than it It is almost always singing It would be like to the crested Wren were not the crest on its Head yellow And yet it is yellow in the folds of its Wings and in their extremities as also upon the Back and about the Tail The Legs Feet Claws and Bill are black but both the extremities of the Bill have something of yellow It is long weak and fit to catch Insects upon which it feeds refusing grain and lives in the shady places of Woods Aristotle mentions a little bird by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gaza renders it Asilus thought to be so called because it is not much bigger than the Insect Oestrus CHAP. XIII The Wren Passer troglodites of Aldrovand by Turner and Bellonius called falsly Regulus IT weighs three drachms being extended from the point of the Bill to the end of the Tail four inches and an half The Wings stretcht out equal to six inches and an half The Head Neck and Back are of a dark spadiceous colour especially the Rump and Tail The Back Wings and Tail are varied with cross black lines The Throat is of a pale yellow the middle of the Breast whiter Below it hath black transverse lines as have also the sides The lower Belly is of a dusky red The tips of the second row of Wing-feathers are marked with three or four small white spots The tips of the covert-feathers of the Tail are alike spotted The number of quil-feathers in each Wing is eighteen The Tail which for the most part it holds erect is made up of twelve feathers The Bill is half an inch long slender yellowish beneath dusky above the Mouth withinside yellow The Irides of the Eyes hazel-coloured The outer Toes are fastned to the middle one as far as the first joynt It creeps about hedges and holes whence it is not
Wagtail Motacilla alba THis Bird is every where so well known that it may seem enough to name it not needing any description It weighs six drachms being in length from the point of the Bill to the end of the Tail seven inches three quarters in breadth between the extremities of the Wings stretcht out eleven The Bill is slender not an inch long sharp-pointed and black The Tongue cloven and as it were torn The Mouth within black The Irides of the Eyes hazel-coloured The Feet Toes and Claws long and of a dark blackish colour The back-claw very long as in Larks The outer Toe at its rise sticks fast to the middle one White feathers encompass the upper Chap of the Bill then the Eyes being produced on both sides almost to the Wings The Crown of the Head upper and lower side of the Neck as far as the Breast and the Back are black The Breast and Belly white The middle of the Back from black inclines to cinereous The Rump is black In another Bird below the Throat I observed a semicircular black spot like a Crescent the horns being produced almost as far as the Jaws The Wings spread are of a semicircular figure the quil-feathers in each eighteen in number of which the three outmost end in sharp points The tips of the middle ones are blunt and indented the inmost are adorned with white lines The covert feathers of the first row are black having their tips and edges white Those of the second row have only white tips It s Tail is very long of about three inches and an half which it almost continually wags up and down whence also it took its name The Tail hath twelve feathers of which the two middlemost are longer than the rest and sharp-pointed the others all of equal length The outmost are almost wholly white the rest black The colour of the Plumage in this kind in several birds varies not a little being in some more cinereous in some blacker The Liver is of a pale colour It is much conversant about the brinks of Rivers and Pools and other watry places where it catches Flies and water Insects Moreover it follows the Plough to gather up the Worms which together with the earth it turns up As I find in Aldrovandus and our Husbandmen have told me of their own observation who therefore call it the Seed-bird as Mr. Johnson informed me In the Northern part of England it appears not in the Winter and is also then more rare in the Sòuthern Either because it is impatient of cold or for want of meat Flies and other winged Insects on which it chiefly feeds being not to be found in Winter-time In the Gizzard of one dissected we found Insects like to Meal-worms Gesner writes that the Fowlers in his Country have observed the Cuckow-chicken hatch'd and brought up by this bird The same Albertus and our experience also confirms as we have elsewhere shewn One or two ounces of the powder of this Bird put in a Pot close-stopt and bak'd in an Oven together with the feathers taken in Saxisrage water or strong White-wine is said to be good against the Stone especially that of the Kidneys But Alexander Benedictus thinks that the modern Physicians who commend this Medicine through mistake mean the Wren when they name the Wagtail As if the Wagtail were of no force in breaking the Stone Gesner to whom also we readily assent thinks that it matters not much what bird be burnt sith the vertue of the ashes of almost all birds seem to be the same Yet saith he if there be any difference I would prefer those sorts of birds which feed upon Insects as Flies Ants and the like §. II. The yellow Water-Wagtail Motacilla flava IN bigness and shape of body it agrees with the white It weighs five drachms from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail being almost seven inches long to the end of the Claws six The under part of the Body is yellow the Breast being darker than the rest The upper part is of a dark green the middle of the Back being black The crown of the Head is of a yellowish green Above the Eyes is a yellow line reaching to the hinder part of the Head The Tail is two inches three quarters long consisting of twelve feathers the middle two whereof are sharper than the rest The outmost on each side are above half white the intermediate eight black All of equal length The figure of the Wings is the same with that of the precedent The quil-feathers in number eighteen of which the sixteenth is longer than those next it and hath the outward limb white The tips of the middle covert-feathers are of a greenish white else the Wings are all over dusky The Bill is black The Tongue cloven but not hairy The Irides of the Eyes from cinereous incline to a hazel-colour The Feet are black The outer fore-toe is joyned to the middle one at bottom The Spur or Claw of the back-toe is long as in a Larks The blind guts short Some birds in this kind are much yellower or greener than others It builds upon the ground among the Corn making its Nest of bents and the stalks of herbs spreading hairs within under the Eggs. It lays at one time four or five Eggs varied with dusky spots and lines drawn without any order §. III. The grey Wagtail Motacilla cinerea an flava altera Aldrov IT is of the bigness of the common or white Wagtail It s note is shriller and louder Its Bill black streight slender and sharp-pointed Its Eyes grey Both upper and lower Eye-lid white Moreover above the Eyes a whitish line is all along extended The upper surface of the body is grey The Head which in proportion to the body is small and compressed is something dusky The Wings are blackish crossed in the middle by a whitish yet not very conspicuous line The Chin and Throat are particoloured of white and grey The Breast and Belly white dashed with yellow The Rump round about of a deeper yellow The Tail made up of twelve feathers longer than the whole body its outmost feather on each side is all over white the two next white on the inside blackish on the out the six middlemost all over blackish The Legs which are long and the Feet which are rugged or rough are of a pale colour but duskish The Claws crooked and the back-claw longer than the rest The bird here described was a Hen as we learned by its Vitellary or bunch of Eggs wherein more than forty Eggs were very conspicuous and easie to be discerned The Cock differs little save that under his Chin he hath a black spot They frequent stony Rivers and feed upon water-Insects The description of this Bird was communicated to us by Mr. Johnson of Brignal near Greta Bridge in Yorkshire CHAP. XVIII * The Brasilian Jamacaii of Marggrave IT is a small Bird of the bigness of a
frequents gardens rather than mountainous places It builds like the Wren or more artificially making an arch over the Nest of the same matter and contexture with the rest of the Nest so that the Nest resembles an Egg erected upon one end a small hole being left in the side whereat the bird goes in and out By this means both Eggs and Young are secured from all injuries of the Air Wind Rain Cold c. And that they may lie soft she lines the Nest within with store of feathers and down Without she builds the sides and roof of it of Moss and Wool curiously interwoven Aldrovand in the seventeenth Book and sixteenth Chapter of his Ornithology doth accurately describe the Nest of this bird such as we have more than once seen in these words It was of an oblong figure like a Pine-apple of two Palms length and one broad round built of sundry materials viz. both tree and earth-moss Caterpillars Webs and other like woolly matter and Hens feathers with that order and art that the chief and middle strength of the work or texture of the Walls was of that yellowish green Moss the common hairy Moss that silk-like matter and tough threads resembling those filaments suspended in the Air and flying up and down like Spiders Webs which are accounted signs of fair weather connected and interwoven or rather entangled so firmly together that they can hardly be plucked asunder Of the interiour capacity all the sides it seemed as well as the bottom were covered and lined with feathers for the more soft and warm lying of the Young The outmost superficies round about was fenced and strengthened with fragments of that leavy Moss which every where grows on trees firmly bound together In the forepart respecting the Sun-rise and that above where an arched roof of the same uniform matter and texture with the sides and bottom covered the Nest was seen a little hole scarce big enough one would think to admit the old one We found in it nine Young c. §. IX The Wood Titmouse of Gesner Parus Sylvaticus Aldrov t. 2. p. 724. THis Titmouse is also very little remarkable for a red spot through the midst of its Crown the parts on each side being black the Legs dusky the Wings black and also the end of the Tail The rest of the body green the Belly paler Our people from the Woods in which it lives especially about Fir-trees and Junipers call it Waldmeiszle and Thannenmeiszle others from its note Zilzilperle for it sings Zul zil zalp Mr. Willughby was apt to think that the bird described by Gesner is no other than the Regulus cristatus CHAP. XXIII §. I. * The Brasilian Tangara of Marggrave IT is an elegant bird of the bigness of a Chaffinch It hath a streight pretty thick black Bill Black Eyes Legs and Feet from cinereous inclining to dusky On the forehead above the rise of the Bill it hath a spot of black feathers The whole Head and Neck are covered with feathers of a shining Sea-green A circle or border of black feathers encompasles the beginning of the back like a Collar But below the Wings to the rise of the Tail the Back is covered with yellow feathers The whole lower Belly is of a rare blue The Wings are black and their lateral extremities blue so that when closed they appear wholly blue and their whole ends outsides or borders tota extremitas seem black The beginning of the Wings also externally shines with Sea-green feathers and in the ridge or upper lateral extremity of each Wing are yellow feathers intermixt It hath a Tail about an inch and half long of black feathers but whose lateral extremities or borders are blue The end of the Tail is black It is kept shut up in Cages and cries Zip zip like the Rubrica called by the Germans Gympel It is fed with meal and bread This description is conceived in such obscure words that I do not well understand the meaning of the Author and therefore the learned Reader would do well to consult the Latine §. II. The second kind of Tangara IT is of the shape and bigness of our common Sparrow Hath a Bill from yellow inclining to dusky somewhat broad sharp-pointed the nether Chap much shorter than the upper Black Eyes The whole Head is covered with feathers of a rare scarlet colour All the rest of the body with the Wings and Tail of a shining black The Thighs are covered with white feathers and in their exteriour sides have an oblong scarlet spot as if they were stained with bloud The Legs and Feet are ash-coloured and have four Toes disposed after the usual manner The Tail is short of an inch length and the Wings end near its rise i. e. when withdrawn or closed reach no further than the rise of the Tail BOOK II. PART II. SECT II. MEMB. II. Small Birds with thick short strong Bills commonly called Hard-bill'd Birds CHAP. I. Of the Gros-beak or Haw-finch called by Gesner Coccothraustes §. 1. The common Gros-beak Coccothraustes vulgaris THis Bird for the bigness of its body but especially of its Bill in which it exceeds all others of this kind doth justly challenge the first and chief place among thick-billed birds The French from the bigness of its Bill do fitly call it Grosbec the Italians Frisone or Frosone Hesychius and Varinus of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 write only that it is the name of a bird but what manner of bird they do not explain Gesner observing that name exactly to fit this bird imposed it upon it It is bigger than a Chaffinch by about one third part short-bodied Its Head bigger than for the proportion of the body It s Bill very great hard from a broad base ending in a sharp point of the figure of a Cone or Funnel half an inch long having a large cavity within of a whitish flesh-colour almost like that of the interiour surface of the mother of Pearl shell only the tip blackish The Eyes are grey or ash-coloured as in Jackdaws The Tongue seems as it were cut off as in the Chaffinch The Feet are of a pale red The Claws great especially those of the middle and back-toes The middle Toe is the longest the outer fore-toe and the back-toe are equal one to the other At the base of the Bill grow Orange-coloured feathers between the Bill and the Eyes black The lower Chap in the Males is compassed with a border of black feathers The head is of a yellowish red or rusty colour The Neck cinereous The Back red the middle parts of the feathers being whitish The Rump from yellow inclines to cinereous The sides and Breast but especially the sides are of a mixt colour of red and cinereous Under the Tail and in the middle of the Belly the Plumage is whiter In another bird the Back was of a grey or ash-colour tinctured with red The Head and Throat greenish The sides and
worse than the former It is recovered by giving your bird some Melon-seed shred and Lettuce seeds and Beet seeds bruised and in his water some Liquorice and white Sugar-candy with a little flour of Oatmeal You must be diligent at the first to observe him when he is sick that so he may have a stomach to eat For in two or three days his stomach will be quite gone and then it will be hard recovering him again The third and worst sort of scouring is the white clammy scouring which is dangerous and mortal if not well looked after at the first This is occasioned by bad seeds and many times for want of water If it be not taken at the first appearance it immediately causeth him to droop and fall from his meat and then all medicines are useless First give him Flax-seeds taking away all other seeds then give him Plantain-seeds if green otherwise they will do him no good For want of Plantain-seeds give him some of the Leaves shred small and some Oatmeal bruised with a few crums of bread And in his water give him some white Sugar-candy and Liquorice with a blade or two of Saffron To avoid the peril of scouring Olina advises to let him have always a piece of chalk in his Cage §. III. The greater red-headed Linnet Linaria rubra major THis is something less than the common Linnet Its Bill short thick of a Conical figure like the Chaffinches the upper Chap black the lower at the base white The Tongue sharp and as it were cut off as in the Chaffinch The Nosthrils round The Eyes hazel-coloured The crown of the head adorned with a red or sanguine colour but not very bright and shining The rest of the Head and Neck round about are cinereous The Shoulders Back and covert feathers of the Wings are red The Breast is tinctured with red The sides under the Wings are of a yellowish red or spadiceous colour The outmost quil-feathers of the Wings are black the inner dusky The exteriour edges of the eight outmost excluding the first are white the white from the bottom towards the top extending it self in breadth in every feather more and more in order till in the ninth feather it reaches almost to the tip These white edges in the Wing complicated concur to make up a white spot externally conspicuous From the ninth the tips of the sixth or seventh succeeding are blunt and indented The interiour margins of all the quil-feathers are white and the tips also of those toward the body or setting on of the Wing The Tail is something forked two inches and an half long made up of the usual number of twelve feathers all sharp-pointed and of two colours both edges as well inner as outer being white but the outer more which colour in the extreme or outmost feathers takes up almost half the breadth of the exteriour Web In the rest it grows narrower and narrower by degrees to the middlemost which are almost wholly black the very extreme edges only remaining white The feathers incumbent on the Tail in the middle along the shaft are dusky their outsides being white It hath small Legs and Feet of a reddish dusky colour but not perfectly black black Claws the hinder the biggest the two outer Claws equal one to the other There is also the like cohesion between the outmost and middle toes as in other birds In the Female neither is the Back bay nor the crown or Breast red but the Back dusky with a tincture of green the Breast of a dirty yellow varied with dusky spots The other notes agree in both Sexes It weighs five drachms from tip of Bill to end of Tail is five inches and an half long to the end of the Claws but five A line of nine inches and a quarter measures the Wings stretcht out It is common on the Sea-coasts §. IV. The lesser red-headed Linnet Linaria rubra minor THis is lesser than the precedent The Back coloured like the common Linnet The forehead adorned with a remarkable shining red spot The Bill like that of the greater red Linnet but less The Breast red the lower Belly white The prime feathers of the Wings and Tail dusky The Tail about two inches long and something forked The outmost borders or edges of the Wing and Tail-feathers round are white The Legs and Feet are dusky the Claws black and long for the bigness of the bird but the Legs very short The like cohesion or adnascency of the outmost and middle toe at bottom as in other small birds In this kind the Female also hath a spot on her head but more dilute than that of the Cock and of a Saffron colour This Bird differs from the precedent red Linnet in many particulars 1. In that it is less 2. That it hath a lesser and sharper Bill 3. That the Hen agrees with the Cock in the spot on its head though it be paler 4. That the Legs and Feet in this are blacker 5. That the border of white about the tail-feathers is narrower 6. That the tips of the second row of Wing-feathers being white make a transverse white line cross the Wing Lastly that this Bird is gregarious flying in flocks not that Aldrovandus describes two sorts of red Linnets neither of which agrees with either of ours in all points See their description in his Ornithology §. V. The Mountain Linnet Linaria Montana THis was found by Mr. Fr. Jessop in the Mountains of the Peak of Derbyshire and sent to us It is twice as big as the precedent The colour of its Head and Back is the same with that of the common Linnet for the middle parts of the feathers of both are black but the outsides or edges of those on the Back red on the Head cinereous The middle parts of the feathers on the Throat and Breast are also black but the edges whitish Only the Rump is of a very fair shining scarlet or Orange-tawny colour The edges of the middle quil feathers of the Wings are white as are also the tips of those of the second row The Tail is two inches and an half long consisting of twelve feathers of which the two middle are all over of one uniform brown or dusky colour Of the rest as well the outer as inner edges are white These white edges in the outmost feathers are broader than in the rest It s Bill is like that of the precedent viz. less for the proportion of its body than that of the second species The whole bird from Bill to Tail was six inches and an half long to the Claws five and an half CHAP. XII The Siskin Spinus sive Ligurinus IT s Head is black The upper side of its body viz. Neck and Back are green Yet the shafts of the feathers on the Back are black and the Neck being darker than the Back seems to partake something of the colour of the Head The Rump is of a greenish yellow The Throat and Breast
end in sharp points The Feet from flesh colour decline to black The Claws are black The outmost and middle Toe joyned at bottom The back-toe great and strong The blind guts short and thick It hath a Gall-bladder The Stomach is musculous In it opened we found seeds c. The Hen as in most Birds is not so fair-coloured The ring about her Neck is darker and scarce appearing The Head Back Shoulders and covert-feathers of the Wings are particoloured of black and dirty red viz. the middle parts of the feathers are black and the outsides red At the base of the Wing are red feathers The Throat is particoloured of red black and cinereous §. V. The Hortulane of the Italians Hortulanus Aldrov Tordino Berluccio at Venice IT is equal and very like to the Yellow-hammer That which I J. R. saw and described at Florence seemed to me somewhat less and longer-bodied The Hen measured from Bill to Tail exceeded seven inches length being in our usual way of measuring ten and an half broad It s Bill was short viz. from the tip to the corners of the Mouth scarce half an inch long thick at base sharp at point of a red or flesh colour in the Cock In the Hen the upper Chap is black the lower blue The knob on the upper Chap is much less than in the Yellow-hammer The sides of the Bill are sharp The upper Mandible hath on each side an angle or furrow impressed to which answereth a tough or angular eminency in the lower as in the Bunting the figure whereof for the clearer apprehension and understanding of what we say is to be viewed The Feet are of a pale dusky The Claws black In the Cock the Legs are reddish The back-toe is great The inner and outer fore-toes are of equal length The outmost from the bottom to the first joynt sticks fast to the middlemost without any membrane intervening as in most small birds The Throat and Breast are ash-coloured the rest of the underside to the very Tail is red The Rump of a deeper red The Head of a brown or dusky ash-colour the middle parts of the feathers being black As they are likewise on the Back having their edges of a reddish ash-colour In the Cocks the Breasts are more red Under the Bill is a yellow spot The Head is of a colour mingled of green and cinereous The middle parts of the Back-feathers are black the edges of a colour mingled of red and cinereous or red and green the Rump is green The quil-feathers of the Wings as in almost all small birds are eighteen in number of which the greater have their edges of a greenish white the lesser or interiour of a red The tips of all the feathers of the second row have their tips white and exteriour edges red The tips of the third row are also white The edges of the lesser coverts are cinereous The Tail is almost three inches long and made up of twelve feathers Of which the middle and outmost are something shorter than the rest For colour the two middlemost are of a dark brown with red edges The three next on both sides black The outmost but one have the upper half of their interiour Webs white The outmost have more white on the interiour Web and some also on the exteriour The Gall-bladder is little and the Gall within yellow It is very like our Reed-Sparrow with a white ring about its Neck yet differs manifestly from it in some marks so that there is no doubt but it is a distinct kind 1. In its place this abiding chiefly among Reeds Whereas the Hortulane frequents Gardens especially as the name imports 2. In colour The Hortulane being more red and wanting the ring about the Neck which this hath And besides having a yellow spot under the Throat which this wants Aldrovand sets forth six kinds or varieties of this bird 1. The first was all yellow almost of a straw-colour excepting the ridges of the Wings and tips of the quil-feathers which were white 2. The second was all over white 3. The third called also by the Fowlers a Hortulane is indeed a bird wholly of the shape of a Hortulane but something different in colour It s Head from cinereous inclined to yellow Its Neck was cinereous but speckled with black Its Belly Legs and Feet yellow The ridges of the Wings and the quil-feathers white the other parts partly black and partly cinereous The whole Tail brown but yellow on the sides 4. The fourth had a green Head and Neck a red Bill ash-coloured Legs else it was black Yet hath it on the crown of the head and also in two of the quil-feathers only an oblong white spot 5. The fifth I may call a white-tail'd Hortulane For its Tail was white else it was like the common Hortulanes but in all parts paler 6. The last some of our Fowlers reckoned a kind of Spipola others a kind of Hortulane and indeed I should make it congenerous rather to the Spipolae than the Hortulanes For its Bill is longer and its Legs and Feet dusky which in the Hortulanes are wont to be yellow It s whole body also is dusky the Breast only and ends of the Wings being white §. VI. * A Bird called by Aldrovand Cirlus stultus IT is equal in bigness to the Yellow-hammers above described of the same make and habit of body the very same figure and shape though it differs in colour It will also willingly fly to and company with them shut up in Cages as to birds of its own feather And besides it constantly no less than they as well flying as resting ingeminates this word Ci Ci. Whence also in some places as at Genoa it is not undeservedly called Cia or for distinction sake Cia selvatica or Cia montanina and by our Bolognese Cirlomatto The upper part of the Head behind and all the Back are adorned with a ferrugineous colour distinguished with pretty large black spots From the Bill over the Eyes to the end of the Neck is extended an ash-coloured line tending to white The Breast and all the Belly are wholly taken up with a ferrugineous colour The prime feathers of the Wings and Tail are blackish yet their outmost borders terminate in a ferrugineous colour Besides the Wings have some white spots In the Tail are one or two feathers on each side partly blackish and partly white We have subjoyned this Bird to the Yellow-hammers and Hortulanes to which it is of kin though whether or no it properly pertain to this Family the figure of the Bill being omitted in Aldrovands description we cannot certainly determine THE THIRD BOOK OF THE ORNITHOLOGY OF FRANCIS WILLUGHBY Esq Of Water-Fowl WAter-fowl are either Cloven-footed which are much conversant in or about waters and for the most part seek their Food in watery places Almost all these have long Legs naked or bare of feathers for a good way above the Knees that they may
called by later Writers Butorius and Botaurus and by Aristotle also Ocnus IN bigness it falls not much short of the common Heron-shaw It s length from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Claws is thirty eight inches to the end of the Tail twenty nine It s Head is small narrow or compressed at sides The crown black At the angles of the mouth on each side is a black spot The Throat and sides of the Neck are red with narrow transverse black lines The Neck being cloathed with very long feathers seems to be both shorter and much greater than indeed it is The long feathers on the Breast are black in their middles The inner part of the Thighs and the lower Belly are white with a light tincture of red The outsides of the Thighs are variegated with black spots The Back is particoloured of pale red or feuille mort and black with cinereous also mingled the black spots being greater there than in the rest of the body The bottoms of the feathers on the Throat are white The great or quill-feathers of the Wings are shorter than in the common Heron. The tips of the greater feathers are black else they are all variegated with transverse red and black lines The lesser rows of Wing-feathers are of a paler red The Tail is very short and little made up of ten feathers of the same colour with the Wing-feathers The black stroaks or marks between the shoulders are broader and tend downwards but the red colour is paler languishing into a yellow It s Bill is streight strong thick at the Head and growing slenderer by degrees to the point of a greenish colour and having sharp sides or edges The sides of the lower Mandible fall within the upper when the Mouth is shut The upper Chap hath a long cranny or furrow or channel excavated on each side wherein are the Nosthrils The Tongue is sharp not cloven reaching scarce to the middle of the Bill The Irides of the Eyes from hazel incline to yellow In another bird they were red The slit of the Mouth is very wide running out beyond the Eyes toward the hinder part of the Head so that the Eyes seem to be situate as it were in the very Bill Under the Eyes the skin is bare of feathers and of a green colour The Ears are great and wide open The Shanks are bare a little above the knees The Feet green The Toes great and very long armed also with long and strong Talons that of the middle Toe serrate on the interiour edge in like manner and for the same purposes viz. of holding fast Eels and other slippery fish as in the rest of this kind The back-claw which is remarkably thick and long above the rest is wont to be set in Silver for a Pick-tooth and is thought to have a singular property of preserving the teeth The outmost fore-toe is joyned to the middlemost at bottom by a membrane They say that it gives always an odd number of bombs at a time viz. three or five Which in my own observation I have found to be false It begins to bellow about the beginning of February and ceases when breeding time is over The common people are of opinion that it thrusts its Bill into a Reed by the help whereof it makes that lowing or drumming noise Others say that it thrusts its Bill into the water or mud or earth and by that means imitates the lowings of an Ox. It hides it self commonly among reeds and rushes and sometimes lies in hedges with its Neck and Head erect In the Autumn after Sun-set these birds are wont to soar aloft in the air with a spiral ascent so high till they get quite out of sight In the mean time making a singular kind of noise nothing like to lowing As for the interiour parts The annulary cartilages of the Wind-pipe after its divarication are not entire or perfectly round but only semicircular The other part of the circle being supplied by a thin loose membrane They stand also at a greater distance one from another than before The Liver is divided into two Lobes and hath its Gall-bladder annexed The interiour membrane of the Stomach is wrinkled and full of papillary glandules Beneath the lower Orifice of the Stomach was as is were a secondary stomach of a singular structure and of the figure of the Letter ∽ having a thick coat and being rugged and uneven with folds or wrinkles within The first stomach was lax and membranous rather than musculous like a Dogs stomach as Bellonius rightly compares it It hath no Craw Only one blind gut like the rest of this kind half an inch long The Gullet just below the Bill may be vastly dilated so as to admit a mans fist In the stomach dissected we found the fur and bones of Mice Instead of the transverse ribs are only small Appendices The Vertebres next the Head are bent downwards all the rest up wards The Breast-bone is arcuate The angle or aperture of the Breast-bone is filled up with a thin loose pellucid membrane The Gullet and Windpipe descend down the right side of the Neck It hath also a bony Appendix in the angle of the Merry-thought but less than the common Heron. It is called by later Writers Butorius and Botaurus because it seems to imitate boatum tauri the bellowing of a Bull. The Author of Philomela calls it Butio But his mistakes are so many that no account is to be made of his authority Some have made it to be the Onocrotalus because of its voice which to say the truth seems to me much more to imitate the braying of an Ass than the lowing of a Bull But Pliny hath so exactly described the Onocrotalus that no man that shall compare the notes with the bird can possibly doubt that it is that we commonly call the Pelecan Though those that have seen and observed it never heard it make any such braying noise when kept tame Which is something strange unless perhaps being discontented with its captivity it delights not to make that noise it doth when at liberty The Bittern is said above all other birds to strike at mens eyes It builds upon the ground commonly in a tuft of Rushes lays four or five Eggs of a round figure and whitish colour inclining to cinereous or green not spotted at all This without doubt is that bird our common people call the Night-raven and have such a dread of imagining it cry portends no less than their death or the death of some of their near Relations For it flies in the night answers their description of being like a flagging Collar and hath such a kind of hooping cry as they talk of §. XIII * Aldrovandus his third sort of speckled Heron. THis Bird sent from Epidaurus was all over of one and the same colour to wit reddish deeper above lighter underneath This same or at least one very like to it taken in our Fens had
pleasant colours render this Bird very elegant and beautiful to behold It is not altogether whole-footed like a Duck yet the three fore-toes are joyned together half-way by a tough membrane the back-toe or keel being pretty long and armed with a strong Talon These birds frequent Fens Lakes and Sea-shores into these waters they run intent upon their prey sometimes also diving under water maintain themselves by fishing as I am assured by our Fowlers upon their credit This Bird is not very frequent at Rome yet is it sometimes exposed to sale among other Sea-fowl It s flesh hath such a fishy taste and stench that being thrown to our Cat she refused it and would not touch it He endeavours to prove this Bird to be the Mergus of Ovid. See the Author All Storks make a clattering or snapping noise with their Bills by clapping one Mandible nimbly against the other They are said to live only in Republics and free-States but this we found by experience to be false observing them in the Territories of some Princes in Germany There is a tradition also that they feed and nourish their Parents in their old age when they are unable to seek their own food Whence the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying the duty of Children in requiting and maintaining their aged Parents §. III. * The American Stork called by the Brasilians Maguari of Marggrave IT is a Bird lik to the Stork in figure and bigness and partly also in colour It hath a Neck a foot long A streight sharp Bill of nine inches length long naked Legs like the Stork a short Tail reaching no further than the Wings It s Bill at botom half way up is of a yellowish green The other half being of a bluish ash-colour It hath small silver-coloured Eyes with a black Pupil and about them a Vermilion-coloured skin and the like also below near the rise of the Bill or between the Bill and the Throat which when she is angry she lets hang down under the Throat after the manner of the Senembi The whole Head Neck and all the body is covered with pure white feathers and on the lower part of the Neck those white feafeathers are of a good length The Tail also is white but above covered with certain black feathers The Wings at setting on are covered with white feathers but near the Back with black which black hath a gloss of green It Legs and Feet are red and like a Storks It snaps also with its Bill like our Country Stork It s flesh is esculent CHAP. III. * The Ibis of Bellonius FOrmerly saith he we took the black Ibis to be the Haematopus But observing its manners and conditions we found it not to be the Haematopus but the black Ibis which Herodotus first mentioned and after him Aristotle It is of the bulk of the Curlew or a little less all over black Hath the Head of a Cormorant The Bill where it is joyned to the Head is above an inch thick but pointed toward the end and a little crooked and arched and wholly red as are also the Legs which are long like the Legs of that Bird which Pliny calls Bos taurus Aristotle names Ardea stellaris It hath a long Neck like a Heron so that when we first saw the black Ibis it seemed to us in the manner and make habitu of its body like the Bittour This kind of Bird is said to be so proper to Egypt that it cannot live out of that Country and that if it be carried out it dies suddenly The Ibes are birds very useful to the Egyptians for destroying Serpents Locusts and Caterpillars with which that Country is greatly infested and therefore divine honours were given them The Ibes saith Cicero dispatch a power of Serpents They turn away a great Plague from Egypt when they kill and consume those flying Serpents that are brought in thither by the West wind out of the Deserts of Libya Whence it comes to pass that they do no harm either alive by their biting or dead by their stench For which cause the Ibes are invocated by the Egyptians What else the Ancients have delivered concerning the Ibis see in Aldrovandus CHAP. IV. §. I. The Spoon-bill Platea sive Pelecanus of Gesner Leucorodius sive Albardeola of Aldrovand Lepelaer of the Low Dutch THat which we described was a young one taken out of the Nest It weighed forty five ounces and an half It s length from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Claws was thirty four inches to the end of the Tail twenty four The colour of the whole body was Snow-white like a Swans Beyond the Eyes toward the Bill grow neither feathers nor down as in the Heron and Cormorant The angle also of the lower Chap is bare which perchance is peculiar and proper to this Bird. The first quil-feather of the Wing is black of the second only the exteriour Web or outer half from the shaft and the tip of the interiour are black of the third only the top and of the fourth yet less In like manner the tips and shafts of the inferiour feathers of the second row were black The Tail is very short viz. three inches and an half made up of twelve feathers The Bill is of a singular and unusual figure plain depressed and broad near the end dilated into an almost circular figure of the likeness of a Spoon whence also the Bird it self is called by the Low Dutch Lepelaer that is Spoon-bill The broad part of the Bill is graven with twelve or fourteen lines or crevises but its inward surface is smooth and even without any such sculptures or gravings The Bill in the young ones before they be grown up is white or of a flesh-colour in old ones black The Tongue is sharp and little The Legs half way up the second joynt are bare of feathers in the young ones of a whitish colour The Feet strong The fore-toes joyned together by a membrane the outmost and middlemost to the second joynt the middlemost and inmost no further than the first The Toes and Claws black We did not observe in our Bird those reflections of the Wind-pipe which Aldrovandus mentions describes and figures It had a large Gall The Guts had many revolutions Above the Stomach the Gullet was dilated into a Bag whose inward surface was rough and uneven with many papillary glandules Its Eggs are of the bigness of Hens Eggs white and powdered with a few sanguine or pale-red spots In a certain Grove at a Village called Sevenhuys not far from Leyden in Holland they build and breed yearly in great numbers on the top of high trees where also build Herons Night-ravens Shags Cormorants c. In this Grove every sort of Bird as they told us hath its several quarter where they build all together When the young ones are ripe those that farm the Grove with a hook on the top of a long pole catch hold of the bough
on which the Nest is built and shake out the young ones but sometimes Nest and all down to the ground §. II. * Tlauhquechul or the Mexican Spoon-bill of Hernandez It is a Bird of a strange Palate It feeds only on living fish and will not touch dead ones It delights in ravin In shape of body is like to the Spoon-bill or Pelecan but almost all over of a most beautiful scarlet or pale red colour It s Bill is broad round toward the end and of an ash-colour The Pupil of its Eye black the Iris red and wrinkled Its forehead like that of a Turkey or Aura Its Head almost void of hairs or feathers of a white colour with near the whole Neck and part of the Breast A broad black ring distinguishing the Head from the Neck It lives about the Sea-shores and Rivers §. III. * The Brasilian Spoon-bill called Aiaia and by the Portughese Colherado Marggrav the same I suspect with the precedent IN figure it agrees with the European Platea differing only in colour Of the bigness of a Goose Its Bill broad like a Spoon and white Its Neck long Its Feet broad It is all white save that the Back and Wings are of a pale carnation colour It s flesh is edible It is very common about the River of St. Francis and elsewhere in Fenny places Probably this Bird is the same with the precedent We have a Bill of I suppose one of these American Plateas which is almost twice as big and long as that of the common European BOOK III. PART I. SECTION III. Water-fowl not Piscivorous with very long slender streight Bills CHAP. I. §. I. The Woodcock Scolopax Aldrov tom 3. pag. 472. IT is somewhat lesser than a Partridge The upper side of the body particoloured of red black and grey very beautiful to behold From the Bill almost to the middle of the Head it is of a reddish ash-colour The Breast and Belly are grey with transverse brown lines Under the Tail it is somewhat yellowish The Chin is white with a tincture of yellow A black line on each side between the Eye and Bill The back of the Head is most black with two or three cross bars of a testaceous colour The prime feathers in each Wing are about twenty three black crossed with red bars The feathers under the Wings are curiously variegated with grey and brown lines The Tail is 3 ⅜ inches long consisting of twelve feathers the tips whereof are cinereous above and white underneath their borders or outsides as it were indented with red the remaining part black The Bill is three inches long or more dark brown toward the end near the Head paler or flesh coloured The upper Mandible a very little longer than the nether The Tongue nervous The Palaterough The Ears very great and open The Eyes stand higher or nearer to the top of the Head than in other birds that they be not hurt when she thrusts her Bill deep into the ground The Legs Feet and Toes are of a pale brown or dusky colour The Claws black The back-toe very little having also but a little Claw The Liver divided into two Lobes having a Gall-bladder annexed The Guts long slender and having many revolutions The blind Guts very short not half so long as that single blind gut the remnant of the Yolk-funnel These are Birds of passage coming over into England in Autumn and departing again in the beginning of the Spring yet they pair before they go flying two together a Male and a Female They frequent especially moist Woods and Rivulets near hedges They are said both to come and to fly away in a Mist At Nurenberg in Germany I saw of them to be sold in August whence I suppose they abide thereabout all the year On the Alps and other high Mountains they continue all Summer I my self have flushed Woodcocks on the top of the Mountain Jura in June and July Some straglers by some accident left behind when their fellows depart remain also in England all Summer and breed here Mr. Jessop saw young Woodcocks to be sold at Sheffield and others have seen them elsewhere Their Eggs are long of a pale red colour stained with deeper spots and clouds Of two that I described one was a Male and the other a Female the Female was heavier than the Male by an ounce and half the Female weighing eleven ounces and an half the Male but ten The Female also was of a darker colour The flesh of this Bird for the delicacy of its taste is in high esteem The Leg especially is commended in respect whereof the Woodcock is preferred before the Partridge it self according to that English Rhythm before recited in the Chapter of the Partridge If the Partridge had the Woodcocks thigh 'T would be the best bird that ever did fly The length of this Bird measured from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail was thirteen inches and an half The breadth between the tips of the Wings extended twenty six inches Among us in England this Bird is infamous for its simplicity or folly so that a Woodcock is Proverbially used for a simple foolish person §. II. The Snipe or Snite Gallinago minor THis weighs about four ounces It s length from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Toes is thirteen inches to the end of the Tail eleven and an half The Wings spread were seven inches and an half wide A pale red line divides the Head in the middle longways and on each side parallel thereto a list of black and without the black over the Eyes another line of the same colour with that drawn along the middle of the Head Between the Eyes and the Bill is a dusky brown line The Chin under the Bill is white The Neck is mingled of brown and red The Breast and Belly are almost wholly white The long feathers springing from the shoulders reach almost to the Tail having their outward halfs from the shaft of a pale red the inner black and glistering their tips red which colours succeeding one another make two lines down the Back The covert-feathers of the Back are dusky with transverse white lines Those incumbent on the Tail are red crossed with black lines The greater covert-feathers of the Wings are dusky with white tips the lesser are particoloured with black red and grey The inside coverts are curiously variegated with brown and white lines The Quil-feathers are in each Wing about twenty four in number of which the outer edge of outmost is white almost to the tip of the succeeding the tips are something white but more clearly from the eleventh to the twenty first else they are all brown But the last five are variegated with transverse black and pale-red lines The Tail is composed of twelve feathers two inches and an half long It seems to be shorter than it is because it is wholly covered and hid by the incumbent feathers The tips of its
the same colour with the middle of the Back The Wings when closed reach as far or further than the Tail it self which is short of about an inch and half or two inches consisting of twelve feathers of an ash-colour The two middlemost darker than the rest and almost black The whole Belly and underside of the Wings as white as Snow The Breast in some spotted or clouded with brown in others perhaps these are the Males no spots appear yet the Breast is darker than the Belly and inclined to red The blind guts are an inch and half long The Stomach not very musculous These birds live upon the sandy shores of the Sea and fly in flocks We saw many of them on the Sea-coasts of Cornwall CHAP. X. * The Rotknussel of Baltner Rotkmillis or Gallinula Melampus of Gesner Aldrov THe German name Rotkmillis saith Gesner seems to be compounded of the colour For this Bird is of a red or russet colour with dusky spots in the Neck and about the Eyes But Kmillis I know not whence derived is a more common or general word sith another Water-hen of this kind is also called Matkmillis We from the colour of the Legs have imposed on it the name Melampus which signifies Black-soot For there is no bird I know of this kind that hath blacker feet The body is dusky with some spots of a sordid and dark colour The Bill also is black The Wings marked with black spots To this Bird saith Aldrovand that which I here give you called by our Fowlers Giarola a name common to many birds is very like if not the same For on the Head Neck and Breast down to the middle of the Belly it is red sprinkled with brown and sometimes also white spots Its Feet and Legs are cole-black The small Wing-feathers are distinguished with cinereous and black The great ones are black The Bill is long and a little bending sharp at point The Belly is white with a tincture of red and curiously spotted with black spots The Tail also is white but black at the end CHAP. XI * Matkneltzel of Baltner Gallinula Erythra of Gesner THis Bird the Germans call Matkern but for what reason saith Gesner I know not I from the colour of its whole body have called it Erythra But though almost the whole body I except the Belly which is whitish with a faint tincture of red and the Legs which are ash-coloured be red yet is that redness darker on the Back and intercepted with white spots Brighter in some of the Wing-feathers the longest whereof approach to the colour of red Oker In the Neck beneath are some white specks The Bill is black not without somewhat of red shorter than in most others of this kind It is taken among Reeds with snares It hath a cry somewhat resembling the sound of Fullers striking of Wool Leonard Baltner describes his Matkneltzel if at least it be the same bird with Gesners Matkern thus It is a very fair beautiful bird From the tip of the Bill to the end of the Claws it is a full Strasburgh Ell long It weighs six Lots and an half that is three ounces a quarter For a Lot is about half an ounce It Guts are an Ell long It frequents Waters and seeks its meat in watery places The Cocks are adorned with beautiful feathers like those of Partridges and have pale-red Feet The feathers of the Hens are less beautiful and their Feet grey Some also weigh thirteen Lots and are three quarters of a Ell long These birds in figure magnitude and colour do very nearly resemble the Female RUFFS which they call REEVES Whether they be the same or not let the Virtuosi at Strasburgh where they are found examine CHAP. XII The North-Country Dunlin of Mr. Johnson IT is about the bigness of the Jack-Snipe or Judcock hath a streight channell'd black Bill a little broader at the end oblong Nosthrils a blackish Tongue The Throat and Breast white spotted with black The middle of the Belly is blackish waved with white lines The lower Belly and feathers under the Tail white All the upper side is red every where spotted with pretty great black spots with a little white Yet the Wings from a grey incline to a brown or dusky colour The Legs and Feet are of a competent length and black The back-toe the shortest The Tail consists of twelve feathers of which the two middlemost are dusky brown with one or two red spots the rest from brown incline to white It gets its food out of the mud The Rotknussel or Gallinula melampus of Gesner and Aldrovand differs not much from this bird CHAP. XIII §. I. The Stint which the French call the Sea-Lark Schoeniclos seu Junco Bellonii An Cinclus prior Aldrov IT is equal to the common Lark or but very little less For the shape of its body like to a Snipe From Bill to Feet eight inches and an half long It s Bill is streight slender black an inch and half long and like to a Snipes bill The Tongue extended to the end of the Bill The Feet dusky or blackish with a tincture of green The toes not joyned by any membrane The back-toe small The colour of the upper side of the body excepting the prime feathers of the Wings and first row of coverts is grey or cinereous with black spots or lines in the middle of each single feather The feathers in the middle of the Back and upper side of the Wings have a tincture of red Mr. Willughby describes it a little differently thus The middle parts of the feathers on the Head are black the edges red or russet The Neck is more of an ash-colour The Back-feathers of a dark purple with reddish ash-coloured edges Those on the Rump of a lighter red with black lines or stroaks down their shafts The Wings are long and when folded up reaching to the end of the Tail The quil-feathers of each Wing twenty four of a dusky colour as far as they appear above the covert-feathers for their bottoms are white and the interiour in order gradually more than the exteriour to the nineteenth which is almost wholly white Mr. Willughby in the bird he described observed the tips of the second row of Wing-feathers to have been also white in the same proportion as in the Sanderling making together a white line cross the Wing yet narrower than in that The exteriour edges of the fifth counting from the outmost and of the subsequent to the eleventh are white The four next the body are wholly dusky and by little and little streightned into sharp points and when the Wing is closed reach almost to the end of the Tail The Tail is scarce two inches long not forked made up of twelve feathers of which the two middlemost are longer than the rest sharper pointed also and darker-coloured All the rest are of a pale ash-colour without any cross lines or bars only their outmost edges whitish All the
Claws little and black It hath a Gall. The flesh also of this Bird is very tender savoury and delicate and in no less esteem than that of the former CHAP. III. The Dottrel Morinellus Anglorum THe Males in this kind are lesser than the Females at least they were so in those we hapned to see For it might fall out to be so among them by some accident The Female was almost ten inches long the Male but nine and an half the Female nineteen inches and an half broad the Male but eighteen three quarters The Female weighed more than four ounces the Male scarce three and an half The Bill measuring from the tip to the angles of the mouth was an inch long The Head elegantly variegated with white and black spots the middle part of each single feather being black Above the Eyes was a long whitish line The Chin whitish The Throat is of a pale cinereous or whitish colour with oblong brown spots The Breast and underside of the Wings of a dirty yellowish colour the Belly white Each Wing hath about twenty five prime feathers of which the first or outmost is the longest the tenth the shortest from the tenth to the twentieth they are almost equal The rest to the twenty fourth are again longer the foregoing than the following The first or Pinion-quil hath a broad strong white shaft The three outmost are blacker than the rest which are of a dusky or brown colour having the edges of their tips whitish The lesser rows of the Wing-feathers are brown with yellowish white tips but those next the quils blackest The middle of the Back between the Wings is almost of the same colour with them The Rump and Neck are more cinereous The Tail is composed of twelve feathers two inches and an half long but the middlemost something the longer The bottoms of all are cinereous the tips white the remaining part black In the outmost feather the white part is broader in the middle ones narrower The edges also of the outmost feathers are whitish The Legs are bare for a little space above the Knees of a sordid or greenish yellow the Toes and Claws darker coloured than the Legs The inner Toe joyned to the middle only at bottom the outer by a thick membrane as far as its first joynt It wants the back-toe wherein it agrees with the green Plover from which yet it is sufficiently distinguished by its colour magnitude and other accidents It s Bill is streight black and in figure like that of the Plover It hath a fleshy stomach in which dissected we found fragments of Beetles c. Its guts were fourteen inches and an half long The Cock and Hen can scarce be known asunder they are so like in shape and colour It is a very foolish bird saith Dr. Key in his Letter to Gesner but excellent meat and with us accounted a great delicacy It is taken in the night time by the light of a Candle by imitating the gestures of the Fowler For if he stretches out an Arm that also stretches out a Wing if he a Foot that likewise a Foot In brief whatever the Fowler doth the same doth the Bird and so being intent upon mens gestures it is deceived and covered with the Net spread for it I call it Morinellus for two reasons first because it is frequent among the Morini And next because it is a foolish bird even to a Proverb we calling a foolish dull person a Dotterel Of the catching of Dotterels my very good Friend Mr. Peter Dent an Apothecary in Cambridge a Person well skill'd in the History of Plants and Animals whom I consulted concerning it wrote thus to me A Gentleman of Norfolk where this kind of sport is very common told me that to catch Dotterels six or seven persons usually go in company When they have found the Birds they set their Net in an advantageous place and each of them holding a stone in either hand get behind the Birds and striking their stones often one against another rouse them which are naturally very sluggish and so by degrees coup them and drive them into the Net The Birds being awakened do often stretch themselves putting out a Wing or a Leg and in imitation of them the men that drive them thrust out an Arm or a Leg for fashion sake to comply with an old custom But he thought that this imitation did not conduce to the taking of them for that they seemed not to mind or regard it CHAP. IV. The Sea-Lark Charadrius sive Hiaticula IN bigness it somewhat exceeds the common Lark From the point of the Bill to the end of the Tail or Legs for they are equally extended being eight inches and an half long a line of black compasses the base of the upper Bill This black line from the corners of the mouth is produced through the Eyes as far as the Ears and then turns up and passes cross the middle of the Head encompassing a broad bed or fillet of white drawn from the inner corner of one Eye to the inner corner of the other The hinder part of the Head is ash-coloured The Chin white The Neck encompassed by a double ring or collar the upper white which underneath reaches as far as the Bill and under the Chin is dilated almost to the Eyes the lower black which is broader in the middle and takes up part of the Breast before also runs out toward the Bill The Back and lesser covert feathers of the Wings are ash-coloured The Breast and Belly white The outmost of the quil-feathers of the Wings is black on the middle of the shaft only spotted with white which colour spreads it self gradually and continually more and more in the following feathers insomuch that the twentieth and twenty first are wholly white Those next the body are of the same colour with the Back The feathers of the second row have white tips excepting the foremost or outmost Hence and from the white of the first row arises a long transverse white line in the Wings The outmost feather of the Tail on each side is white as also the tip and exteriour half of the next of the three following only the tips The two middlemost are of the same colour with the Back or a little darker The Tail is two inches and an half long made up of twelve feathers of which the outmost are the longest of the rest the interiour are a little shorter in order than the exteriour The Tail-feathers in divers birds vary in colour for in some the two outmost feathers are wholly white and the tips also of the middlemost The Bill is short scarce an inch in length of two colours For beneath toward the Head it is of a deep yellow or gold-colour more than half way toward the point black The upper Mandible a little longer and somewhat crooked In others perhaps they were young ones we observed the whole Bill to be black The Tongue is not
the sides The Tongue is pretty broad not cloven rough at the end The Irides of the Eyes are red The lower Eye-lid is not feathered In the young birds neither the Bill nor the bald spot in the forehead are red The Legs are green The Claws of a dark brown near black indifferently long The Toes long as in the Coot the middle the longest next the outmost all broader and plainer below than in the other cloven-footed birds for the use of swimming The back-toe broad as in Coots serving them perchance as a Rudder to steer and direct their course The Legs are feathered almost down to the knees between the feathers and the joynt marked with a red spot From the Shoulders or setting on of the Wing all along its base or ridge and to the very ends of the feathers runs a line of white The longer feathers under the Wings are curiously adorned with white spots or lines tending downwards The Breast is of a lead-colour The Belly inclining to grey or ash-colour Under the Tail are white feathers as it swims or walks it often flirts up its Tail and shews the white especially when it puts down its head to pick up any thing The Back and lesser rows of Wing feathers approach to a ferrugineous colour Else it is all over blackish In the Male the feathers under the Tail are whiter the Belly more cinereous and the Back more ferrugineous It s Liver is small Gall-bladder great the Gall within being of a greenish black colour It will feed very fat It s flesh is well tasted and even comparable to that of Teal It gets its food on grassie banks and borders near Waters and in the very Waters especially if they be weedy Feeding I suppose upon the water-Insects it finds among the weeds It builds upon low trees and shrubs by the water side breeding twice or thrice in a Summer and when its young ones are grown up it drives them away to shift for themselves Its Eggs are sharp at one end white with a tincture of green spotted with reddish spots It strikes with its Bill like a Hen It sits upon boughs but those only that are thick and near the water It lives about Motes and great Pools of water near Gentlemens houses It flies with its Feet hanging down §. II. The other green-footed Water-hen of Aldrovand perchance our Water-Rail THis Bird from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail is almost eighteen inches long It hath a Bill two inches long both above and underneath for some space yellow the remaining part being black The Neck and Head are black The Back and upper part of the Wings of a chesnut-colour The nether part of a dark cinereous Only the extremes of the Wings are white The lower Belly also is almost all white On the sides towards the Wings it is covered with thick feathers The Tail ends sharp being above of a chesnut-colour underneath white The Thighs are covered with ash-coloured feathers varied lightly with transverse white borders not altogether down to the Knees The Legs are green The Toes long furnished with Claws a little crooked broad and plain underneath perhaps that it may swim with them when there is need or occasion The Female is in all parts paler than the Male. This Bird if it be not our Water-Rail is I confess to me unknown I do indeed suspect it to be the Rail though to say the truth the marks do not agree Wherefore I would not omit its description that the Reader comparing it with that of the Rail may himself judge §. III. Another green-footed Water-hen of Bellonius like to a Coot perchance our Grinetta WE have necessarily separated the Water-hen la Poulette d'eau from the lesser and greater Coot de la Poule Macroule because it swims not in the water nor is Web-footed We have imposed the name of Water-hen upon this Bird from its likeness though it be much less yet is it bigger than a Rail so that it seems to partake of both The Fowlers to whom we shewed it seeing it to be like a Coot would needs perswade me that it differed only in bigness being not yet come to its full age and growth Whereupon I did more diligently search out some discriminating notes Among which this was the chief that this Water-hen had green Legs and Feet not unlike to a Bitterns and not so plain nor having such broad appendant membranes as in a Coot The Tail also of this Water-hen is longer and the bare spot upon its forehead less In colour it is indeed like to a Rail but tending to that of a Coot Wherefore at first sight I took it to be a Rail but viewing it more carefully I observed that it had white Eye-lids which neither Rail nor Coot have In the Tail were two white feathers one on each side Under the Breast it inclined a little to blue The Back is of a deep chesnut colour Some also are blacker than others and have the folds of their Wings white and moreover another white line in the lesser Wing which its first feathers longways of the quil or shaft compose The same meat was found in its Stomach as in the Rails and Coots It hath a Breast-bone and a Hip-bone different from other Birds yea even from the Coot It s flesh is like that of the Morehen tender and of easie digestion Its bones easie to be broken Its Liver also brittle It s Craw large Its Guts and Entrails as in a Coot When roasted also it is of the same taste with a Coot It builds breeds and brings up its young like the Rail This Bird in many things resembles our Grinetta or Gallinula poliopus minor of Aldrovand so that I doubt not but it is the same Howbeit I thought fit to insert its description in this work that I might leave the Reader to the freedom of his judgment §. IV. The Water-Rail called by some the Bilcock or Brook-Ouzel Rallus aquaticus Aldrov i. e. Ortygometra Bellonii Also the Gallinula chloropus altera Aldrov And perchance the Gallinula Serica of the some So of one species he makes three IT is like the common Water-hen but less bigger than a Quail of a slender narrow or compressed body From point of Bill to the end of the Claws sixteen inches long to the end of the Tail but twelve According to our usual way of measuring sixteen inches broad It s Head is small narrow or compressed sideways It s Bill like the Ruffs about two inches long streight compressed likewise sideways red especially the lower Mandible and lower part of the upper for toward the top or point it is black smooth and hard The Tongue reaches to the very end of the Bill and is white and rough at the tip It hath a round black bald spot or naked skin in the forehead but much less than that of the Coot so
membranes armed with sharp and crooked Claws The Thighs are also hid in the Belly It is of the Mergi Diver or rather Colymbi Doucker kind In diving it can hold its breath a long time and no bird can plunge under water more nimbly and speedily than it as they experience who shoot them For so soon as the powder flashes it presently ducks under water before the bullet can come at it It builds its Nest so near the water that it can if need be speedily cast it self into it But when it betakes it self again to its Nest fastning its Bill into the earth it hangs its whole weight upon it till it raises up its body and so by degrees reaches its Nest It perceives before by a peculiar natural instinct when there are about to fall great showers and shots of rain and fearing lest the flouds should destroy its Nest and Young its makes a querulous noise and cry On the contrary when it presages fair weather it expresses its joy by chearful acclamations and another more pleasant note It lays yearly three or four Eggs as big as Geese Eggs of a green colour and spotted They say that at set times of the year they depart into hotter Regions and return not until the Spring be well come on Whence they think it ominous for any one to hear the cry of this bird first fasting The Norwegians think it a sin to kill or disturb this Bird which they account holy They sometimes catch it in their Nests against their wills and sometimes shoot it with Guns The Islanders because they eat it take it either with a snare or with an angle-line They fasten two stakes at the entrance of the Nest upon which they hang and so accommodate the Snare that the Bird going to her Nest may thrust her head into it Or they cross the Pool where she frequents at its narrowest part with a fishing line so that one on each side holds it raking therewith the surface of the water till the bird fearing some danger towards dives down to the bottom then observing the place where she is rising up again by the circles there made in the water thither they direct and there hold a snare fastned to the line that coming up out of the water she may put her head into it and so be caught by the Neck It s skin is used to defend the Head and Breast from the injury of cold and preferred before a Swans This Bird Besler hath figured in his Gazophylacium by this title A singular kind of exotic Water-Swallow But it hath nothing almost common with a Swallow §. IV. * The small black and white Diver with a short sharp-pointed Bill THe Picture of this Bird was communicated by that worthy person Sir Thomas Brown It hath a short Bill a little bending at the end both Mandibles The top of the Head the Back Wings and in general the whole upper part is black excepting a transverse line of white in the Wings The Chin Throat Breast as far as the middle of the Belly and sides of the Tail white The Tail short The Legs of a sordid green The Toes web'd together The Picture doth not shew any hind-toe This Bird saith Sir Thomas is not usual with us I have met with but two of them brought me by a coaster who could give it no name SECTION VI. Of SEA-GULLS called in Latine LARI CHAP. I. Of Gulls in general GUlls are a whole-footed fowl with an indifferent long narrow sharp-pointed Bill a little crooked at the end oblong Nosthrils long and strong Wings short Legs small Feet for they do not swim much a light body but invested with many and thick-set feathers a carrion carkass the fat that is sticking to the skin as in other birds much upon the Wing very clamorous hungry and piscivorous These we divide into two kinds First The greater which have Tails composed of feathers of equal length and an angular prominency or knob on the lower Chap of the Bill underneath to strengthen it that they may more strongly hold fishes 2. The lesser which have a forked Tail and no knob on the Bill Both kinds may be divided into pied or particoloured and grey or brown CHAP. II. The greater Gulls with Tails of equal feathers And first such as are pied or particoloured of white and cinereous or black §. I. The great black and white Gull Larus ingens marinus Clusii THis Bird the biggest by much of all the Gulls we have hitherto seen weighed four pounds and twelve ounces It s length from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail was twenty six inches Its breadth from tip to tip of the Wings distended sixty seven It s Bill was yellow compressed sideways more than three inches long something hooked at the end and like in figure to those of the rest of this kind The lower Mandible underneath bunched out into a knob marked on each side with a double spot the lower red the upper black The edges of the Eye-lids round about were of a Saffron colour The Head great flat-crowned Both Head Neck Breast Belly and Tail white The middle of the Back and the Wings excepting the tips of the quil-feathers were black Each Wing had about thirty four feathers in the first row all black with white tips It s Tail was six inches long made up of twelve snow-white feathers Its Legs and Feet white Its Claws black It had a small back-toe a wide Mouth a long Tongue a large Gullet It preys upon fishes For out of its stomach dissected we took a Plaise entire It had a great Liver divided into two Lobes with a Gall adhering Short and small blind guts A musculous Stomach and an oblong Spleen In another bird of this kind which was I suppose a young one both the top of the Head and the Neck were particoloured of black and white The Back and Wings paler than in that described I suppose that this is the very same bird which Clusius describes in the fifth Book of his Exotics Chap. 9. under the title of a huge Sea-gull though his description be not so full and exact as being taken only from a Picture This Bird we saw and described at Chester being not rarely found on the Sea-coasts near that City In the Feroe Islands it is called The Swarth-back §. II. The Herring-Gull Larus cinereus maximus IT is well nigh as big as a tame Duck From tip of Bill to the end of the Toes twenty four or twenty five inches long to the end of the Tail twenty two or twenty three Between the terms of the Wings stretched out fifty and in some fifty five inches broad The weight was different in several birds one weighing only twenty six ounces another thirty another thirty four The Bill was yellow two inches long narrow as in the rest of this kind but pretty deep The lower Mandible not streight as in other birds
is shut The Tongue is fleshy thick broad especially toward the tip but the tip it self is thinner and semicircular The Eyes are of a deep yellow The Legs and Feet of a Vermilion colour The Claws black The hind-toe little The membrane connecting the Toes serrate about the edges The Feet are less than inothers of this kind The Head and Neck almost half-way are of a fair blue In the Bird which I described at Rome and in another which Mr. Willughby saw at Crowland it was very dark lightly tinctured with a deep shining green The under-side of the Neck and region of the Craw are white the upper-side and Shoulders particoloured of white and brown The rest of the Breast and the whole Belly to the Vent are red Behind the Vent the feathers under the Tail are black The Back is brown with a light dash of a shining green blue or purple colour The feathers covering the outside of the Thighs are adorned with transverse dusky lines as in many others The number of quils in each Wing is about twenty four The ten or twelve outmost whereof are wholly brown The next nine have their outer edges of a deep shining green The four next the body are varied in the middle and about their edges with white lines The feathers of the second row incumbent on the green quil-feathers have white tips which together taken make a cross line of white in the Wing The lesser covert-feathers of the Wing excepting those on the outmost bone are of a pleasant pale blue inclining to ash-colour The Tail is about three inches and an half long consists of fourteen feathers particoloured of white and black the outmost feathers being wholly white the middlemost except the extreme white edges wholly black the rest black in their middle parts white about the borders or outsides At the divarication of the Wind-pipe it hath a small labyrinth A large Gall Oblong Testicles A small musculous Stomach or Gizzard Guts many times reflected very long The Female in respect of colours both in the Head and Neck and also in the whole body upper-side and under-side excepting only the Wings is very like to a wild Duck. The Wings are of the same colours with the Wings of the Male but more dull and not so bright and pleasant The Fowlers affirm that these Birds change their colours in Winter Gesner and Aldrovand set forth this kind twice or thrice under several titles It is sufficiently characterized and distinguished from all others of this kind by the breadth and bigness of its Bill §. XVI The broad-bill'd red-footed Duck of Aldrovand which I take to be the Hen-Shoveler THe Legs and Feet wholly are of a deep red The Bill is almost three inches long very broad and turning up after the fashion of a Buckler of a dark chesnut colour yet the lower Mandible which almost enters the upper being received into it is in some places of a spadiceous colour and hath a remarkable strake running through its middle long-ways The Bill hath such teeth on both sides as Gesner attributes to his Muggent The colour of the feathers almost the whole body over comes near to that of pulveratricious birds Partridge and Quail c. called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is testaceous or pot-sheard colour Their pots were paler than ours now adays The whole Head and middle of the Neck were of a Weasel colour sprinkled with greater and lesser spots partly white and those very small and scarce conspicuous partly brown and those most in the crown and hinder part of the Head The Neck underneath is of a pale whitish cinereous colour with semilunar brown spots The same spots but greater are dispersed over the fore-part of the Back the Breast the Belly the Rump and the Tail all which parts are of the same colour with the Head or yellowish The middle and lower part of the Back are covered with feathers of a dark spadiceous colour only white about the outmost edges The ridges of the Wings are of a Woad colour A line of the same colour crosses the middle of the Wings above which is likewise seen a transverse white line The remaining parts of the Wings are of a dark spadiceous colour §. XVII * A broad-bill'd Duck with yellow Feet of Aldrovand IT differs little from the precedent in magnitude unless perchance it be somwhat bigger It s Bill is partly brown partly yellowish Over the whole body which is of a yellowish ash-colour are brown spots disseminated thick-set and little in the Head greater and thinner or more scattering in the Neck Breast Belly Rump and Tail but much greater yet and thicker in the whole Back The Wings to the middle part are brown A white line crosses them in the middle after which is seen a square blue spot three angles whereof end in a black line To this succeeds a white line Its Legs are yellow its Toes also yellow but connected by dusky membranes This seems to be some Hen-bird of the Duck-kind not hitherto observed by us CHAP. III. Pond-Ducks frequenting chiefly fresh waters §. I. The common wild Duck and Mallard Boscas major Anas torquata minor Aldrov IT weighs from thirty six to forty ounces being about twenty three inches long measuring from the tip of the Bill to the end of the Tail The Wings stretcht out reacht thirty five inches The Bill is of a greenish yellow from the angles of the mouth produced two inches and an half of about an inch breadth not very flat The upper Mandible hath at the end a round tip or nail such as is seen in most Birds of this kind The lower Eye-lids are white The Legs and Feet of a Saffron-colour the Claws brown but that of the back-toe almost white The inmost fore-toe is the least The membranes connecting the Toes are of a more sordid colour than the Toes The Wind-pipe at its divarication hath a vessel we call a labyrinth The Legs are feathered down to the Knees In the Mallard the Head and upper part of the Neck are of a delicate shining green then follows a ring of white which yet fails of being an entire circle not coming round behind From the white ring the Throat is of a Chesnut colour down to the Breast The Breast it self and Belly are of a white ash-colour bedewed or sprinkled with innumerable dark specks as it were small drops Under the Tail the feathers are black The upper side of the Neck from cinereous is red sprinkled in like manner with spots The middle of the Back between the Wings is red the lower part black and still deeper on the Rump with a gloss of purple Thesides under the Wings and the longer feathers on the Thighs are adorned with transverse brown lines making a very fair shew In them the white colour seems to have a mixture of blue The lesser rows of Wing-feathers are red The long scapular feathers are silver-coloured elegantly
figure encompasses the tip of the feather running parallel to its edges within this is included another semicircular white line parallel to it and in the white again a black The Breast is white The Belly darker with transverse black spots Under the Tail the feathers are crossed with brown The lesser covert-feathers under the Wings and the interiour bastard Wing are purely white The sides are curiously variegated with alternate black and white lines The Tail is short scarce appearing beyond the feathers incumbent on it round-pointed made up of sixteen feathers with sharp tips of a white colour especially on the under side for the two middle ones above are of a dark ash-colour In the rest especially the outmost there is something of red mingled with the white The edges of all are whitish Each Wing hath twenty six quils of which the first ten are brown the three next tipt with white The four following have their outer Webs black their tips also being whitish In the three succeeding the inner Web of the feather is wholly white The four next the body are of a cinereous or reddish brown The feathers of the second row incumbent on the white quils have their exteriour Webs of a black purplish shining colour In the third row are spots of red scattered It s Bill is like that of the common Duck or Teal flat broad with a hook or nail at the end The lower Mandible inclines to a Saffron colour of the upper the sides are of the same colour the middle part black The Nosthrils great The Legs are feathered to the Knees The Feet whitish The hind-toe small The inner fore-toe shorter than the outer The membranes connecting the Toes black It hath a huge Gall-bladder The Female hath the same spots in the Wings but far duller colours wants the black colour on the Rump the feathers there growing having pale red edges as have also those on the Back and Neck It wholly wants those elegant semicircular black and white lines and spots in the Neck and Breast feathers and the strakes under the Wings This Bird may be distinguished from all others of the Duck-kind by this characteristic note that it hath on the Wings three spots of different colour one above another viz. a white a black and a red one §. III. * Gesners Muggent Anas muscaria Aldrov lib. 19. cap. 41. IT is so called because it catches flies flying upon or above the water It is of the bigness and shape almost of a tame Duck. The Bill is broad and flat it s upper Chap being wholly of a Saffron-colour in length beyond the feathers two inches it is serrate on both sides with broad and in a manner membranaceous teeth pretty high or deep but those of the nether Chap are lower and rise not much making long striae The Plumage almost all the body over is particoloured of blackish fiery colour and white with a mixture of Weasel colour in some places or in short almost like that of the Partridge that is testaceous as of most of the pulveratricious kind but yet differing Its Feet are yellow Its Toes joyned by blackish membranes Its Neck both on the upper and under side is speckled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the colours we mentioned The crown of the Head is blacker than the other parts which colour also is seen in the Wings which are shorter than the Tail Thus far Gesner This Bird if it be different from the Gadwall as the colour of the Bill and Feet might perswade one is to me unknown §. IV. The common Wigeon or Whewer Penelope Aldrovandi tom 3. p. 218. lin 30. Anas fistularis Argentoratensibus Ein Schmey IT weighs twenty two ounces Its length from Bill to Feet is twenty inches The Head and upper end of the Neck are red The crown towards the Bill is of a dilute colour from red inclining to a yellowish white The upper part of the Breast and sides as far as the Wings is beautified with a very fair tincture of a red Wine colour with small transverse black lines The scapular feathers and those on the sides under the Wings are very curiously varied with narrow transverse black and white waved lines The middle of the Back is brown the edges of the feathers being cinereous especially towards the Tail The feathers behind the Vent next the Tail are black The Breast and Belly white with a little mixture of yellow On both sides under the Legs are spots of a reddish brown Under the Tail are white feathers alike spotted mingled with the black The Tail is sharp pointed and consists of fourteen feathers of which the six outer on each side are brown their exteriour edges being whitish the two middle ones are black with a mixture of ash-colour Of the quil-feathers the ten outmost are brown The next ten have white tips and among them the fifteenth sixteenth seventeenth and eighteenth have their outer webs first of a black purplish colour then as far as they appear beyond the covert-feathers of a lovely blue In the eighteenth feather the exteriour half of the outer web is of a purplish black the interiour toward the bottom is cinereous But along the border of the black are small white spots from the white tip to the bottom The twentieth feather is all of a pale or white ash-colour The twenty first and twenty second are white about the edges black in the middle along the shaft The small covert-feathers of the Wings are of a light brown or dark ash-colour but those that cover the quils from the tenth to the twentieth are particoloured of brown white and cinereous Mr. Willughby in this and other Birds is in my opinion more particular and minute in describing the colours of each single feather of the Wings and Tail than is needful sith in these things nature doth as they say sport her self not observing exactly the same strokes and spots in the feathers of all Birds of the same sort In the structure of the Mouth Tongue and Head it differs little from the common wild Duck unless perchance the Head be less in proportion to the body The upper Mandible of the Bill is of a lead-colour with a round black nail at the end The Feet from a dusky white incline to a lead-colour The Claws are black The outmost Toe longer than the inmost The back-toe short It feeds upon grass and weeds growing in the bottoms of Rivers Lakes and Channels of water also upon Whilks Periwinkles c. that it finds there The Males in this kind at Cambridge are called Wigeons the Females Whewers The flesh of it for delicacy is much inferiour to that of Teal or indeed Wild-Duck §. V. The Sea-Pheasant or Cracker Anas caudacuta Aldrov tom 3. pag. 234. Coda lancea at Rome IT is of the bigness of the common Wigeon of twenty four ounces weight twenty eight inches long from Bill to Tail From tip to tip of the Wings extended thirty seven inches broad
a sort Colcuicuiltic or the Quails Image is also a sort of Quail varied with white black and scarlet Plumes above rather produced in lines than round spots underneath disposed rather into thick-set spots than lines Its Feet and Legs are blue But for its note bigness conditions and all other qualities it is altogether like the precedent Acolin is of the bigness of a Stare hath pale-green Legs and Feet divided into four pretty long Toes It s Bill is yellow and of the longest for the proportion of its body slender also and sharp-pointed Its Eyes black its Irides fulvous and Head small The under side of the body is white the sides spotted with brown The upper surface of the body and the Tail which is short are fulvous but spotted with black lines of white encircling all the feathers sprinkled or powdered sometimes with specks of the same colour It frequents Lakes and hath a fishy taste yet is it no unpleasant meat It feeds usually upon Worms Flies and other Insects flying about the Fens It breeds in the Lake of Mexico It s Head glisters with a wonderful variety of colours a black line dividing it in the middle and others of a grey or ash-colour distinguishing the sides The exteriour corners being pointed with small white spots The Neck and Breast are grey cinerea the rest of the Plumage from fulvous rather incline to green Of the Snow-bird or Ceoan IT is a little bigger than a Thrush Esteemed of for imitation of humane speech About the Breast Belly and setting on of the Wings fulvous near the Tail are grey feathers mingled with the fulvous The ends of the Wings and the Tail it self underneath are cinereous But above all the body is of a dark brown The Bill which is small and slender and the Legs are fulvous The Chin is white yet having some black feathers intermixt It imitates humane speech mocking and as it were deriding those that pass by Whom yet if it may it will follow Of the Cenotzqui or Snow-calling bird IT deserves its name because before it snows it cries afterwards is silent It is remarkable for variety of colours Having a fulvous Breast pale Legs black Claws a Belly spotted with black and white Under the Wings it is white and ash-coloured above fulvous black and then cinereous spotted with black and near the ends or tips speckled with white It s Tail underneath is black and white above fulvous spotted with black It s Head is black encircled with a wreath of grey Its Bill small grey both above and beneath but above near its rise encompassed with a yellow line Its Eyes are black and Eye-lids pale It endures any kind of air or weather but abides in mountainous places and in the Spring-time breeds and brings up its Young It so turns its Head up and down winding its Neck every way that abiding immovable in the same site it can look round about it There is also another sort of this Bird differing in some varieties of colour having its Head fulvous and grey its Neck partly black and partly white which some call Loceto Of the Bird called Pauxi I Take this to be the same with the Mitu of Marggravius and with the Mountain Bird or Tepetototl above described The whole difference is in the Crest instead whereof this Bird hath a certain tumour at the root of its Beak of the figure of a Pear and the hardness of a stone of a blue colour like that of the Turcois stone In another place he saith that this tumour called a stone though it be not over-hard is like an Egg or bigger of a rusty colour Of Picicitli THe small Bird called Picicitli appears after showers It is noted for the obscurity of its original The Tetzcoquenses do not yet know where it breeds It is a mute Bird brought up in the house it soon dies and decays It gratifies both the Palate and Stomach It is all over ash-coloured except the Head and Neck which are both black Only a white spot encompasses its black Eyes Of the Polyglott Bird. I Saw heard and admired a small Bird brought to Madrid the Queen of all singing Birds that could command any voice or tune The Indians from its multiplicity of notes call it Cencontlatolli or four hundred tongues It is not bigger than a Starling white underneath brown above with some black and white feathers intermixt especially next the Tail and about the Head which is encircled with the likeness of a silver crown It is kept in Cages to delight the ear and for a natural rarity or rather wonder It excells all Birds in sweetness and variety of Song and perfect command of its voice imitating the note of any sort of Bird whatsoever and excelling its exemplar It goes far beyond the Nightingale I my self kept it a long time It is content with any meat it loves hot Countries but can abide temperate Tzaupan is like to this Some suspect that it is only the Hen of the same sort they being equal in bigness singing alike and agreeing in shape saving that the feathers underneath are white cinereous and black those above sad-coloured black and white Of the singing Night-bird CHicuatli or the Night-bird is of the bigness of our Woodcock hath a long slender black Bill and crooked yellow seams near each Eye The lower parts of the body are of a pale colour with a few black feathers intermixt about the Neck The Eyes are black with yellow Irides The rest of the body is of a mingled colour of fulvous brown and grey It lives in the Mountains and flies low Being kept in a Cage it prattles or chatters prettily It is easily brought up for it is wont to feed upon bread made of Tlaolli Worms Gnats and other Insects It is taken both in hot and cold Countries it feeds fat and affords no contemptible nourishment Some there are that call it Chiquatototl from the Owl being a Bird not less Augural and ominous than that Of the Xomotl WE owe the protection and coverture of our nakedness not to Sheep and Quadrupeds only for the Indians weave the feathers of this Bird into their Garments It is whole-footed hath its Back and Wings above black its Breast brown When it is angry it ruffles up the feathers upon its Head like a Crest Of the Rabihorcado THis Bird divides its forked Tail into two parts sometimes opening sometimes shutting or drawing them together like a Tailors Sheers Therefore it is called Rabihorcado and by the Portughese Raboforcado An account of some Birds of the Ferroe or Ferroyer Islands out of Hoiers Epistle to Clus THe Birds of the first and second Classis are inserted already into this work in their proper places In the third Classis or rank saith the Author I place three Species different in shape but in this quality very near of kin that they presage storms and tempests and abide only far out at Sea The biggest of these is much
with her This will make them acquainted together Thus continue doing till your Dog throughly knows his duty And be sure to keep your Dog tied up for if you let him go loose it will spoil the best Dog that is And never give him a reward but when he makes in at such Fowls to rescue the Hawk CHAP. X. Of the Sparrow-hawk THe Sparhawk saith Latham though a demy-creature yet for her spirit and mettle is worthy to march in the best company Nay there is no better Hawk than she if she be kept as she ought to be lusty and strong Besides he that knows how to man reclaim and fly a Sparrow-hawk may easily know how to keep and deal with all other Hawks And herein lieth an excellency in the Sparrow-hawk she serves both for Winter and Summer with great pleasure and will fly at all kind of Game more than the Falcon. If the Winter Sparrow-hawk prove good she will kill the Pie the Chough the Jay the Woodcock Thrush Blackbird Fieldfare Latham adds the Rook Mew Lapwing Ring-dove House-dove To be kept strongly in the Hood and flown from it she is a most excellent Hawk and will kill more Partridge in one day than the best long-winged Hawk will do in two Her diet should be of the daintiest meat unless in times of rest and then also well washt and dried again especially if she be mewd Against she is to fly she must be prepared with a short cut to put a perfect edge upon her and then she will fly after the best manner Also she should not be flown in the Morning unless she be prepared over night with a short and clean supper for the purpose Likewise you ought to have always about you a little box full of fresh Butter mixt with a little Saffron and Sugar-candy to give with her meat now and then or let her eat it out of the box Which she will do with great delight and it will keep her head evermore loose and in good temper and also prevent the Cray and keep her proud and full of spirit For the Eyas or Nyas Sparrow-hawk which is of greatest difficulty to bring to perfection you must first feed her in some cool room which hath two Windows the one to the North and the other to the East which must be open and barred over with Laths not so wide for a Hawk to get out or Vermine to come in Strow the Chamber with fresh leaves and do in every respect to this Room as was ordered for the mewing of the Falcon. You must feed your Eyas with Sparrows young Pigeons and Sheeps hearts Whilst she is very young and little you should cut her meat or shred it into small pellets and feed her twice or thrice aday according as you find her endew it or put it over When she is full summed and flieth about then give her whole small Birds and sometimes feed her on your Fist suffering her to strain and kill the Birds in your hand and sometimes put live Birds into the Chamber where she is that she may learn to foot and to kill them and let her feed upon them in your presence By this course you will not only neal her but take her off from that scurvy quality of hiding her Prey when she hath seised it a natural property belonging to all Eyasses Likewise every morning go into the Room call her to your Fist whistle and use such terms as you would have her hereafter acquainted with When she hath put forth all her Feathers and is full summed then take her out of the Chamber and furnish her with Bells Bewets Jesses and Lines It will be altogether requisite to seel her at first that she may the better endure the Hood and handling And let it be a Rufter-hood that is large and easie which you must pull off and put on frequently stroaking her often on the Head till she will stand gently In the evening by Candle-light unseel her giving her somewhat to tire upon handling and stroaking her feathers gently hooding and unhooding heras often as you think fit Before I proceed any farther I shall inform you how to seel a Hawk after the best manner Take a Needle threaded with untwisted Thread and casting your Hawk take her by the Beak and put the Needle through her Eye-lid not right against the Sight of the Eye but somewhat nearer the Beak that she may have liberty to see backward and have especial care that you hurt not the Web Then put your Needle through the other Eye-lid drawing the ends of the Thread together tie them over the Beak not with a streight knot but cut off the Threads near to the end of the knot and so twist them together that the Eye-lids may be raised so upwards that the Hawk may not see at all but as the Thread shall slacken she shall be able to see backwards only which is the cause that the Thread is put nearer the Beak When your Eyas is well won to the Hood and to the Fist let her kill small Birds thereon then call her two or three days or longer till she will come far off then take a live Pigeon tied by the foot with a Creance and stir it till your Hawk will bate at it and seise it but not far off that you may quickly help her at the first lest the Pigeon struggling with her she prove too strong and so discourage your young Hawk Then let her plume and foot her and feed her thereupon whistling the while that she may know it another time Then hood her and let her plume and tire a little You may use her to Trains of Chicken and Quail And when she will seise readily by often Training ride out with her in the morning into the Fields where calling your Sparrow-hawk to your Fist and giving her a bit or two go with your Spaniels to seek some Beavy of young Quails advancing your Fist aloft that your Hawk may see them when they spring flying her at advantage If she kill reward her c. if she miss serve her with a Train of a Quail Let your Dogs hunt on your right hand when they range but especially when they quest and call to the end you may the better cast off your Hawk When your Hawk is throughly entred and well nouzled you may then hold your hand low for she will now bate at the Whurr But whatever you do have a quick eye and a good regard to the Spaniels not coveting to be too near them but a little above them that you may let your Hawk fly coasting at the advantage when the Game springeth §. II. Of the Brancher Soar Mewed and Haggard Sparrow-hawk HAving spoken of the first kind of Sparrow-hawks viz. the Eyas the other four in the title of this Chapter must consequently be discoursed of I shall give you but few instructions for in effect the same precepts that serve for the Eyas will serve also for the Brancher