The Teal which from the absence of the white crescent in both sexes, I have thus named, is well known in Jamaica, and has probably been mistaken for the female of discors, with which it associates. Its manners are said to be identical with those of its congener. It much resembles C. Fretensis of Eyton, but has not the broad yellow spot on the beak, nor the barred flanks.

The stomachs of such as I have dissected, contained small seeds, and coarse sand. One was brought me alive in March; its voice, when alarmed, was a very subdued hissing, like that of a goose, but very softly. I have met with this species only in Spanish Town.

The eastern point of Old Harbour is occupied by a salt-morass, immediately opposite Goat Island, which affords the principal supply of Ducks to the Spanish Town market; and more particularly since the construction of the railway has driven the birds from Passage Fort. The morass borders the little cove called Galleon Harbour, and extends over a small projecting peninsula, where it is cut into natural channels, intersecting each other at right angles, through which the sea flows, which are almost as regular as if cut by art. The surf, driven through them by the sea-breeze, and the frequent passage of boats, keep these singular canals open, and prevent the growth in them of the mangroves, which are perpetually throwing out their bow-like roots, and encroaching on every unoccupied space. It is at the open pans formed by the intersection of the canals, that the Ducks of various species congregate: when the gunners approaching in boats up the canals, come suddenly upon the flocks, and taking them in enfilade, bring down numbers at a shot.

SPINOUS SQUAT-DUCK.[127]

In a broad piece of water near Radonda, which is crossed by the high road from Savanna le Mar to Negril, and which is connected with the vast morass that lies behind the former town, I have seen these curious little Ducks. Rarely more than three are visible at one time, scattered over the water, often very near the road. They pay very little attention to passing travellers; but if one stop and gaze at them, they take alarm, and sink the body lower into the water, until the back is level with the surface. If they suspect danger, they gradually sink wholly under water; and if suddenly alarmed they thus immerse themselves in a moment, not diving as other water birds do, but sinking as they sit, causing scarcely a ruffle of the surface. I have found them excessively wary, and difficult to shoot; because if they come up and still suspect danger, they immediately sink again, and remain beneath an incredible while, even for several hours, unless they can manage to expose the nostrils to the surface without appearing. When they do rise, it is in the same noiseless, almost imperceptible manner, and in the same posture as they went down. Occasionally they fly, or rather flutter with much flapping of wings, and apparently painful exertion, across the pond, splashing the surface as they go; and I have seen one take a higher flight across the road to the lower water. When undisturbed, they sit long in one place, and spend a good deal of time in smoothing their plumage.

The stomach of the specimen I obtained, a male, from which the description was taken, contained only seeds mostly comminuted.

From a recent letter of Mr. Hill’s I extract the following notes. “We have certainly two if not three different Pond Ducks. With two I am familiarly acquainted. One is a very beautiful little bird, with such a prevalence of yellow and red ochre in the plumage, and with the usual crescent shaped ocellated markings of the Duck tribe, so dark, as to give it a very quail-like appearance. It has in consequence been commonly designated the Quail-duck.[128] The secondaries of the wing are white; the head is dappled black and ochry-white, and the bill is a brilliant cobalt-blue. The tail is stiff and curved upwards, with (I think) 16 black feathers which radiate broad and distinct, without any lapping of one feather over another. In the nestling bird the feathers are differently formed. They are unwebbed in the centre of the shaft, the terminal plumes being few, and curved like the Υ of the Greek alphabet.

“The other is a short squat Duck, almost square in form, the breadth of its body being equal to its length, and uniformly coloured wood-brown;—a description of the plumage not perhaps very precise, but so much so with respect to the ordinary hue of the bark of trees, as to make it sufficiently indicative of the prevailing colour. The centre shafts of the tail of this bird terminate in long stiff spines, as stiff and as long as those of a horse-comb.

“I shall not venture to say how far similarity of structure in the tail of the Erismaturine family of Ducks with that of the Cormorant, indicates a similarity in the application of this organ for diving purposes, as Mr. Eyton has conjectured; but a bird kept in a small pool in a flower garden, into which pond-weeds were daily thrown, particularly chara and duck-weed, (pistiaceæ) upon which it was supposed to feed, would lead me to think that one important purpose that this remarkably constructed organ was applied to, was to move aside the dense vegetation of shallow pools in which it fed. The habit of this bird was to turn round quick. By this motion it opened out the weeds on the surface, so graphically described by Shakspeare as ‘the green mantle of the standing pool,’—and made a clear space for ‘swithering with its neb,’ as Lincolnshire decoy-keepers would say. It dived frequently, and the period it remained submerged was prodigiously long. It swam backward as frequently as forward, and, I apprehend, found its peculiarly made tail a powerful lever in dilating the space behind it. The little garden, in which the bird was kept, that furnished me with these observations, was a fair representation of its natural haunts. Tufts of flowers, composed of lilies, kincalmias, and Indian-shot, with intermixtures of young vegetating bananas, were an apt substitute for the heliconias, nymphæas, cyperaceæ, juncales, and marantaceous plants, among which it delighted when wild and at large. It sometimes crept on the bank, and sheltered itself among the bowery herbage; but the clots of damp weed, strewn around its pond, were its favourite resting place when out of the water; and there it sat crouching, not sitting upright as the Grebe does. In its natural haunts it is occasionally flushed, but its flight is exceedingly short, not usually more than from the bank into the mantling herbage of the pond, where it instantly disappears in those long submersions I have already noticed.”

The remaining Anatidæ which have been observed in Jamaica, I shall dismiss with a bare enumeration, furnished by my esteemed friend to whom this work is so deeply indebted. Though some of them have fallen under my own notice, I have nothing to add to their known history. I treat them in this summary manner, the more willingly, because my friend is himself preparing for the press a treatise on the migratory birds of Jamaica, the fruit of many years’ close observation.

Fam.—PELECANIDÆ. (The Pelicans.)

RUFOUS-NECKED PELICAN.[129]

The high-road from Bluefields to Savanna le Mar winds round the broad bend of the coast, called Bluefields Bay; for nearly half the distance, running close to the shore, which in some parts is a low sandy beach, in others, rocky and precipitous. About a mile from Bluefields the road recedes about a hundred yards from the sea, the intervening space being occupied by tall and dense wood, consisting chiefly of manchioneel, crablight, sweet-wood, and tropic-birch, much tangled by an underwood of briers and supple-jacks. As we approach the brow of the cliff, we perceive that the descent, just here, is not a perpendicular rock, but is a very steep slope, covered with a loose and shifting rubble, very unpleasant and even dangerous to the feet. Two enormous birches and a fig, at some distance from each other, springing out of the brow, spread their immense boughs even over the sea that boils among the rocks beneath; and the observer needs no informant to tell him that these trees are occupied as resting places by many large birds. The earth, and bushes, and rocks beneath, are splashed widely with white ordure, the fishy fetor of which is diffused all through the woods, and is but too perceptible even at the highroad. Scattered upon the ground lie the long bones, bleached in the wind, and the sable feathers, of several Frigate-birds, who met their death where they had been accustomed to live; the victims perhaps of disease, or perhaps of mutual encounters. High up on the loftiest and outmost limbs sit many Pelicans, some preening their plumage, others, with the long beak resting on the breast, enjoying a sluggish repose. Frigates and Boobies are associated with them, but of these we shall speak presently.

From many visits to this place, which commonly goes by the name of the Pelican hole, I have observed that the Pelicans which resort hither, leave the roost at early dawn, and fish for two or three hours; they return about eight o’clock and rest on the roosting trees until about eleven; then they go abroad again and fish along the shore or sit lazily on the rocking sea, till dusk, when in long strings they fly wearily homeward, and spend the night upon their favourite trees.

It is a pleasant sight to see a flock of Pelicans fishing. A dozen or more are flying on heavy, flagging wing over the sea, the long neck doubled on the back, so that the beak seems to protrude from the breast. Suddenly, a little ruffling of the water arrests their attention; and, with wings half-closed, down each plunges with a resounding plash, and in an instant emerges to the surface with a fish. The beak is held aloft, a snap or two is made, the huge pouch is seen for a moment distended, then collapses as before; and heavily the bird rises to wing, and again beats over the surface with its fellows. It is worthy of observation that the Pelican invariably performs a somerset under the surface; for descending, as he always does, diagonally, not perpendicularly, the head emerges looking in the opposite direction to that in which it was looking before. When the morning appetite is sated, they sit calmly on the heaving surface, looking much like a miniature fleet.

In the evening, as I have stated, we see them pursuing their laborious course to repose. Standing at the door of Bluefields, which from a slight elevation, commands a wide prospect of the beautiful Bay, I have often watched, in the evening,—while the sun, sinking among his gilded piles and peaks of cloud on the horizon-sea, leaves the air refreshingly cool and balmy, while the dying sea-breeze scarcely avails to break the glassy reflection of the surface,—the straggling flocks of Pelicans, from a dozen to forty or fifty, passing slowly along over the shore. On such occasions, they manifest a decided tendency to form long continuous strings, like ducks. When the flocks are beating for fish, or sailing round and round on the watch, there is no such arrangement, but all circle in a confusion equal to that of the planets of the Ptolemaic system. Yet at any time of the day, in taking a lengthened flight, whether shifting their locality, or slowly sweeping over the sea, they usually take a lineal order.

In flying thus in lines, I have been struck with the unity which they manifest in their motions: the flight is performed by alternate intervals of heavy flappings, and sailing on outstretched motionless wing; and the resumption or suspension of the one or the other state, is regulated by the leading bird of the line. For example; the first begins to flap; in an instant the second begins, then the third, then the fourth, and so on, with perfect regularity of succession; and neither ceases till the first does, and then only each in his own turn. That this does not depend on the period of each motion being constant, is shown by the fact, that the duration of either state is very varying and arbitrary. If a bird be following the same course, near at hand, but not within the line, he does not regard the succession at all, but governs his own motion.

The Pelican on alighting on the water to swim, brings his feet, which before had been stretched out behind, into a standing position, and, as it were, slides along the surface, for several yards before he swims.

Voracious and formidable as is the Pelican to the smaller of the finny races, he is not without his enemies among them. I once observed a large Shark gliding along at the surface of the water near a flock of swimming Pelicans, wilily endeavouring to approach some unwary one within seizing distance, his triangular dorsal cutting the water and revealing his progress, and his intentions. The Pelicans were alert, however, and did not choose a near acquaintance with their insidious admirer, each one rising into safety upon the wing as he approached. I fear he went without his supper on that occasion.

The following interesting note, I quote from a valuable paper by Mr. Hill, “On the aerating powers of birds,” read at a meeting of the Jamaica Society, June 1st, 1840. “The facility with which the Pelican resigns itself to fasting, or rouses itself to feasting, was very interestingly exhibited to me in a bird, I saw the other day at Passage Fort. It was a domesticated Pelican, of mature age: it winged backward and forward, visiting the wild flocks, and feeding with them in the harbour during the day, and withdrew from them to roost in its master’s yard during the night. In that period of restraint, when it was necessary to observe the caution of drawing its quill feathers, to keep it within very diminished capabilities of flight, until it became familiar and domesticated, it was wholly dependent on the fish provided for it by the fishermen of the beach. Sunday was no fishing day with these men; and this was regularly a day on which there were no supplies for the Pelican. It became in time so conscious of the recurrence of this fast-day, that although at all other times it went daily down to the sea-side to wait the coming in of the canoes, on the seventh day it never stirred from the recumbent trunk of a tree on which it roosted within the yard. It had been found necessary to pluck its wing within the last two or three months to restrain it within bounds, in consequence of its absence latterly with the wild birds for several days in succession; and in this state it was reduced as formerly to depend on the fishermen for food. The old habit of abstinence and drowsy repose on the Sundays again recurred, and when I saw it, it was once more a tranquil observer of the rest, and with it the fast, of the Sabbath day.”

Robinson describes one in captivity, as “a bold fierce bird, which would snap his beak not only at dogs and other small animals, but even at men and horses, that came inadvertently within his reach.” (MSS.)

The Pelican is sometimes taken much in the same manner as Gannets in England. A fish is fastened to a board, which is swiftly drawn through the sea by a canoe under sail; the Pelican plunges down upon it, and breaks his neck with the violence of the contact. Although the beak is not pointed, but hooked at the extremity, Sam has assured me that it has been known to be driven through the soft wood of the cotton tree, when that has been used for the board. The flesh is eaten by some of the negroes, notwithstanding its insupportable fishy odour; to overcome which in some degree, they bury it for some hours in the sand of the beach, after which they subject it to three or four boilings before it is eaten.

The term fuscus is but poorly applicable to this bird in adult plumage: the long and pointed feathers, being black with a central stripe of pure white, give a hue rather hoary or silvery than fuscous; and the pale yellow head, and deep chestnut neck, margined with a white edging, adds a considerable degree of beauty to the whole.

I dissected a female in May; an operation which though performed in the open air, was almost sufficient to take away the breath. I found the stomach a long capacious sac without constriction, with thick muscular walls; there was a round cavity just beyond the pyloric bend; the intestinal canal was nearly uniform in size, slender, but long, with many convolutions; it measured 99 inches; near the middle was a curious conformation, which I have observed in the intestine of the Ardeadæ; as though the tube had been abruptly terminated and closed, and another tube let in at the side of the former a little way from the end, which end thus projected like a teat. Two cæca, about 1½ inch long when distended. The appearance of the viscera corresponded in most particulars to that described by Prof. Owen (Pr. Zool. Soc. 1835) in P. rufescens. The right lobe of the liver was three or four times greater in volume than the left; the former had its edges rounded; the latter was sub-globose. The gall-bladder small; the gall deep brown-yellow. The spleen was large, oval, about 1¾ by 1¼, soft, and greenish-black. Kidneys about equal, 2 inches by 1 inch. The fat about the viscera, which was in series of small lumps, was of a deep orange, or almost salmon-red. I may add that our species seems much more arboreal than that described by Prof. Owen. On bending the heel-joint, so as to bring the tarsus up towards the tibia, the toes were strongly incurved; and on my placing a stick beneath the toes, and then forcibly bending the heel, the stick was grasped with so much power that it could with difficulty be dragged away. I perceived from the form which the foot assumed under such circumstances, that the hind toe is opposed to the others in grasping or perching, notwithstanding their continuity of membrane; the web which connects the hind-toe being wide enough to admit an object like the branch of a tree, when the toes are opposed.

The tongue is singularly minute; the rami of the hyoïd bone, passing on each side of the larynx, are simply enveloped in the membranes of the pouch, and at their convergence, there is a minute projecting point of cartilage about ¹⁄₆ inch long, which is the only apology for a tongue.

I was astonished to observe that the whole inner surface of the skin on the trunk, was cellular, especially on the breast; composing an immense congeries of membranous cells, inflated with air. The pouch held seventeen pints of water, which when full dripped out at a wound in the fore-arm.

DUSKY BOOBY.[130]

The trees described in the preceding article as constituting the lodging place of the Pelicans, are frequented also, though less regularly, by a considerable number of these Boobies. They usually huddle together, in little groups, sitting closely side by side, so that four and five may frequently be brought down at a shot.

I have invariably found the stomachs of those thus obtained, quite empty, and as the Frigate-birds assemble on the same trees, I conjecture that the Boobies examined had been compelled to disgorge the prey they had taken, by the assaults of their powerful neighbours: to avoid whose attacks, probably, they took refuge on the trees. As they sit, they frequently utter a loud croaking cackle.

One which was disabled, manifested great ferocity, striking forcibly with the opened beak, endeavouring to pierce with its very acute points, as well as to cut with its keen saw-like edges. It had the sagacity to neglect a stick presented, and strike at the hand that held it; and my fingers could testify to the lacerating power of their formidable weapon.

The tails of all the specimens that fell into my hands, were much worn at the extremity; probably from incubation on the rocks. The use of the very singular pectination of the middle toe, was indicated, by its being choked up in each one with down. The great length of the body in these birds is particularly observable when the integuments are removed. In one specimen, I found lying among the folds of the intestines, a tape-worm, about three feet in length.

The above is the only Sula that we know anything of, about the coast of Westmoreland; but Mr. Hill has identified three others from the Pedro Kays, some of which appear to frequent the little Kays of the coast near Kingston. I believe they are the Sula fiber, or drab-coloured Booby, S. piscator, or White Booby, and S. parva, or Black and white Booby. Of this last Mr. Hill has a pair domesticated, of whose habits he has favoured me with the following pleasing notes.

“The sympathy shewn by gregarious birds for their wounded companions is usually never more strongly manifested than in the Boobies. In the wanton sport of shooting at them when sailing past the kays and islets they resort to, there are few who have not witnessed the extraordinary efforts made by the clamorous flock to assist a wounded bird, when fluttering in the water, and unable to regain the wing. An accident which happened to one of the two Boobies we have in our yard, gave us an opportunity of seeing traits of this feeling, and of its attendant emotions. My little nephew, in chasing with a small whip one of our birds, entangled the lash about its wing, and snapped the arm-bone. The one bird not alone shewed sympathy for the other, but exhibited curiosity about the nature and character of the accident. Our two birds are male and female. The wounded Booby withdrew into a lonely part of the yard, and stood there drooping. The female sought him as soon as she heard his cry of agony, and after ascertaining, by surveying him all round, that the injury was in the wing, proceeded to prevail on him to move the limb, that she might see whether he was really disabled beyond the power of using it for flight. After a quacking honk or two, as a call to do something required of him, the female stretched out one of her wings;—the wounded male imitated her, and, making an effort, moved out, in some sort of way, the wounded member to its full length. He was now required by a corresponding movement to raise it:—he raised the broken arm, but the wing could not be elevated. The curiosity of the female was at a standstill. After a moment’s pause, her wounded companion was persuaded to make another trial at imitation, and to give the wings some three or four good flaps. He followed the given signal, gave the required beats upon the air with so thorough a good will, to meet the wishes of his curious mate, that he twirled the broken wing quite round, and turned it inside out. The mischief was prodigiously increased. It was now necessary to put a stop to this process of investigation of the one bird into the misfortune of the other. I came in just as these exhibitions had occurred, and taking up the bird with its twisted wing, I was obliged after setting the limb, to restrain him from any further gratification of his mate’s curiosity by tying the wing into place, and keeping it so tied, till the bone united. The one now attended the other, and carefully examined, day after day, the broken limb. Calling on him to make an occasional effort to raise the disabled and immovable member, she used her ineffectual endeavours to persuade him to lift it, though tied, by lifting her own from time to time.

“Though this fellow-feeling was so strongly and so remarkably manifested with regard to the broken wing,—when feeding together, the abler female did not hesitate to take advantage of her greater agility, by snatching away from her mate his share of victuals, and grappling with him for one and the same piece of meat. Instinct seems to exhibit simple, not complex emotions. If the male bird had been utterly unable to feed himself, the female would, possibly, herself have supplied him with food:—but, able to eat, the undivided passion was the feeding appetite; and the instinctive habit of striking at the prey, and grabbing it, was not capable of restraint, or of any modification whatever.

“The Booby has an uncontrollable predilection for elevated spots as perching places. If a single stone be higher than others in the yard, the Booby’s eye perceives it, and there he takes up his station, and stands, when he has fed, and is satisfied. If a log or a bundle of wood lie about, he mounts it, and perches upon it to sun himself, extending his wings over his tail, and erecting his dorsal feathers for the admission of the genial beams of morning. He roosts upon similar vantage spots, generally on the tops of the triangular coops in which are kept our fattening poultry. He has great prehensile power with his foot; and his serrated middle-toe is frequently applied to scratch the naked skin about his eyes and face. Our birds are fonder of flesh meats, such as beef and pork, than of fish. They dislike fat, and generally reject it, if it be given separately from the lean. They never drink, and are just as regardless of the water about the yard, as if they had been as unadapted for it, as hens and turkeys.”[131]

FRIGATE-BIRD.[132]
Man-of-war bird.

But that the history of the Pelican and the Booby made allusion to the roosting place near Bluefields necessary, I should have preferred to describe it under the present article; for though the trees are common to the three species, the former two frequent the place less numerously, and less constantly than the Frigates. At most hours of the day, one either sees a large number of these birds resting on the lofty trees, or else soaring and circling round and round over the place. Occasionally, in the middle of the day we see half a dozen sailing at an immense height in the air; where their size and colour, the graceful freedom of their motions, and the sublimity of their elevation, might cause them to be confounded with the John Crow Vulture, were it not for the curvature of their wings, the long-pointed tail, often opened and closed, and a superior elegance in their general form.

Being desirous of knowing at what hour the Frigates came home to the roosting place, I visited it on several evenings. On the first occasion, arriving there just as the sun was setting, I found I was not sufficiently early to witness the congregating of the birds, for my ears were saluted, even when in the high-road, by the loud and unpleasant croaking of the Boobies. On my getting to the foot of the first Birch-tree, I could discern many of these sitting on the branches; but as the view was much intercepted by the bushes and trees around, I scrambled down the shingly precipice, to the sea-side. Then on looking up I saw the boughs of the birch immediately over my head, studded with these noisy birds, preening their plumage, or scolding and fighting harshly with one another, as they sat side by side. While thus gazing upward, I narrowly escaped the misfortune of Tobit. There may have been thirty Boobies in sight, and about eight or ten Frigates, but no Pelicans except three on a tree at a little distance. All on a sudden, however, the Frigates flew off as by common impulse, accompanied by at least fifty more, which I had not seen, they having been concealed by the foliage, or having been sitting on the neighbouring trees,—and by as many Boobies, leaving a good number of the latter, however, still remaining.

Though they all flew about in various directions over the sea, they did not retire from the vicinity; but the Frigates presently separated from the Boobies, taking a loftier elevation, where they sailed and circled in silent dignity, while the Boobies were clamorous in their evolutions.

The latter soon sought their perches again; and this gave rise to incessant squabbles, for if a flyer attempted to alight beside a sitter, the latter, as if affronted at the intrusion, began, with elevated wings and opened beak, to resist, croaking vociferously. The Frigates were long before they returned; some sailed out half a mile, and there performed their elegant manœuvrings, while others still hovered above the roosting trees. Among these some were wholly black, some had the white breast of the female sex, and others the white head of youth, and one was conspicuous by his blood-red pouch, inflated into a tense bladder beneath his chin. From the fact that very few, indeed, possess this red pouch, I incline to think it a peculiarity of mature age; for many had the livery of the adult male, whose pouch was inconspicuous, and of a pale buff hue. At length, as the increased darkness gathered in, they also began one by one to settle, very charily, often making a feint to alight, and again sailing off. Some slowly wended their way farther down the bay, and some I left still in the air.

A few days after, I again went between three and four o’clock, but even then the Frigates were reposing in great numbers, but few Boobies, and no Pelicans. I shot a Frigate, which of course aroused the whole flock: and I then had an opportunity of ascertaining their numbers. As they sailed gracefully round, I counted them twice, and both times made them about fifty, but of course I could not be quite exact: from other observations, I should estimate the number of those which habitually repose there to be about sixty, more or less. During an hour and a half that I remained, they did not again alight, and when the sun was close to the horizon they were still soaring in their sublime evolutions. About one sixth of the number were white-headed, their snowy heads and breasts gleaming now and then, as the slanting rays were reflected from them to the observer; and several displayed the inflated scarlet pouch, a little constricted in the middle. As the Frigate flies, the form of its wings reminds one of enormous bats, but for the lengthened tail. When about to alight, they sometimes cackle a little, but are generally silent. As they sit on the branches they are incessantly employed in picking the vermin from their bodies, with which they are much infested. This is done partly with the beak, but partly with the foot; and I have seen them, after scratching themselves, put up the foot to the beak, apparently delivering something into the mouth. Occasionally they throw the head back, and make a loud clattering with the beak. Passing along the road one forenoon in May, a large number were wheeling round the roosting place, some alighting, and others rising. Those which were on the wing uttered, particularly as they swooped near the tree, on which they made as if they would alight, a repeated chuck, not loud, with a rather rapid iteration.

It would appear that this place has been frequented by the Frigates, for at least a hundred years. Robinson has this note: “On a large cotton-tree, between Mr. Wallo’s and the Cave, by the sea-side, come to roost many Man-of-war birds, about four o’clock in the evenings, which tree may be easily approached by a canoe, whence the Men-of-war and other sea-fowl may be shot, either in the evening, or before sunrise; for the Man-of-war birds will not leave their roosting-places before sunrise, in this resembling the Noddy. Dr. Gorse of Savanna le Mar, from whom I had this account, observed that the cotton-tree was blanched or whitened by their dung.” (MSS. ii. 83.)

I have never seen the Frigate fishing; but have frequently found flying-fish in its stomach half digested.[133] Nor have I ever seen it attack the Booby, to make it disgorge, though the fishermen of Jamaica are familiar with this habit. Dr. Chamberlaine, who apparently describes from observation, says of the Frigate, “He is almost always a constant attendant upon our fishermen, when pursuing their vocation on the sand-banks in Kingston Harbour, or near the Palisados. Over their heads it takes its aerial stand, and watches their motions with a patience and perseverance the most exemplary. It is upon these occasions that the Pelicans, the Gulls, and other sea-birds become its associates and companions. These are also found watching with equal eagerness and anxiety the issue of the fishermen’s progress, attracted to the spot by the sea of living objects immediately beneath them.

“And then it is, when these men are making their last haul, and the finny tribe are fluttering and panting for life, that this voracious bird exhibits his fierce and pugnacious propensities. His hungry companions have scarcely secured their prey by the side of the fishermen’s canoes, when with the lightning’s dart, they are pounced upon with such violence, that, to escape its rapacious assaults, they readily in turn yield their hard-earned booty to this formidable opponent. The lightness of its trunk, the short tarsi, and vast spread of wing, together with its long, slender, and forked tail, all conspire to give him a superiority over his tribe, not only in length and rapidity of flight, but also in the power of maintaining itself on outspread pinions in the regions of his aerial habitation amidst the clouds; where, at times, so lofty are its soarings, its figure becomes almost invisible to the spectator in this nether world.” (Jamaica Alm. 1843, p. 87.)

I know nothing positive of the nidification of the Frigate. On the face of Pedro Bluff, about four feet from the surface of the sea, which, however, in stormy weather dashes furiously into it, there is a hole into which a man may crawl, but which, within, widens into a spacious cavern. A person who had visited this place, told me that on its floor lie the skulls and bones of men, mouldering in damp and decay; the relics, probably of some of the unfortunate Indians, who preferred death by famine to the tortures and cruelties of the Spaniards. To this cave, he affirmed, the Frigates and Pelicans resort to lay their eggs; depositing them on the projecting ledges and shelves of the soft and marly rock. On my way up to Kingston from Bluefields in June, lying windbound under the Pedro, I induced a white man residing there to accompany me to the face of the Bluff, where he said the Pelicans and Frigates roosted, and where the former built and laid. After walking about a mile in the most burning heat, through cacti, aloes, and spinous bushes, a most peculiar vegetation, and over the sharp needle-like points of honey-comb limestone, occasionally leaping deep clefts, we came to the spot. Many birds of both kinds were sitting on the low stunted trees, but we could not find a single nest nor eggs; though, as my guide said, at some times they were numerous, but only of the Pelican; of the Frigate’s nidification he knew nothing.

The gular pouch of the old male, is not connected with the mouth, like that of the Pelican, but appears to be an air-cell; perhaps having some analogy to the erectile caruncles of the male Turkey. If we take the skeleton of the Pelican as a standard, the sternum of the Frigate is greatly developed laterally, as that of the Booby is, longitudinally. The middle claw is pectinated. I think I know of no bird so infested with entozoic worms as the Frigate. Immense bunches both of tænoid and cylindrical worms are found in almost every specimen, besides some curious kinds apparently of a higher organization. Bird-lice and bird-flies also infest it.

One which was wounded, on being taken up, was fierce, endeavouring to seize with his beak. And a specimen kept alive by Dr. Chamberlaine, became animated and pugnacious when the children or servants approached it, and struck at them with its formidable bill.

TROPIC BIRD.[134]