188

LIFE OF COLONEL MACERONI.

deserve. That they are birds of passage, I have no doubt;but their migrations also are always in the night. April andOctober are the seasons for their change of residence, and ona moonlight night, often have I been directed by theirpeculiar cry to look aloft, when 1 have seen a flock of manydozens, leisurely flying along, as if upon a settled journey, toan appointed place. There are far many more of these birdsin England than is generally supposed. I have often on amoon light night seen large flocks of them passing over theRegent’s park generally in the direction of east to west.What dream or circumstance could ever have procuredthese birds the misnomer of “ goatsucker,” I am quite at aloss to divine 1 Something similar to that which attributedto serpents the stealing of the milk from the cows, whichhad been probably filched by Hodge himself, their falseaccuser.

The multitudes of the Moor-lien tribe and the variety ofspecies is quite bewildering to those who do not know howto classify them. In the canals and drains which line theroad from Rome to Naples, through the Pontine marshes,at some periods of the year, the disturbance of the passing-carriage, will excite such screams from scores of thousandsof those birds, as actually to drown the voices of personsconversing in the vehicle. The only variety of this gallin-acious bird, which I think it worth while to notice, is ofsmall dimensions, not bigger in the body than a blackbird,but its peculiarity consists in the construction of its feet,the toes of which will measure from point to point almosttwelve inches span. Through this formation the bird isable to walk upon the surface of the water, wherever theleast particle of weed, or aquatic vegetation can be includedin the great expanse of feet, which act like the snow shoesof the Esquimeaux and Canadian huntsmen.

Scorpions are very abundant at Naples, but I never heard