§. 1. The common or white Stork: Ciconia alba.

IT is bigger than the common Heron: Its Neck thicker and shorter than the Herons: Its Head, Neck, and fore-part white: The Rump and outside of the Wings black: The Belly white. The quil-feathers of the Wings black: The Tail white: The Bill long, red, like a Herons Bill. The Legs long, red, bare almost to the Knees or second joynt from the Foot. The Toes from the divarication to the first joynt connected by an intervening membrane. The Vertebres of the Neck are four­teen in number. Its Claws are broad, like the nails of a man; so that [...]. will not to be sufficient to difference a man from a Stork with its feathers pluckt off. N. B. Herodotus attributes such like Claws to the white Aegyptian Ibis. The Claw of the middle Toe is not serrate. It is seldom seen in England, and not unless driven overby a storm of wind, or some other accident. My honoured Friend Sir Thomas Brown of Norwich, a person deservedly famous, for his skill in all parts of learning, but especially in natural History, sent me a Picture of one of these birds taken on the Coast of Norfolk, drawn by the life, with a short description of it, as follows. It was about a yard high: It had * Of a red lead colour. *red Bill and Legs; the Claws of the Feet like hu­mane Nails. The lower parts of both Wings were black, so that when the Wings were closed or gathered up, the lower part of the Back appeared black. Yet the Tail, which was wholly covered and hid by the Wings (as being scarce an inch long) was white, as was also the upper part of the Body. The quills were equal in bigness to Swans quills. It made a snapping or clattering noise with its Bill, by the quick and frequent striking one Chap against the other. It readily eat Frogs and Land-snails which we offered it; but refused Toads. It is but rarely seen on our Coasts. So far Sir Thomas Brown: Whose description agrees exactly with ours in all points.

The white Stork, saith * In his Annotations on Recchus his Animals. *Joannes Faber, is very rare in Italy: All these twenty eight years that I have spent at Rome, I never but once saw a white Stork, and then but one, on the top of the Tower, called Torre de Conti, I know not by what wind driven thither. Aldrovandus also himself an Italian born, and then a very old man, confessed that he had never seen a white Stork, for that the Territory of Bologna did neither breed nor feed them. But sith it is most certain, that Storks before the ap­proach of Winter fly out of Germany into more temperate and hot Countries, very strange it is, Italy being contiguous to Germany, and hotter than it, that they should not fly thither, at least pass over it in their flight Southward.

I know them (saith the same Faber) who have learned by ocular inspection, that Storks and Peacocks, when such Serpents as they swallow passed alive through their bodies, (as they will do several times, creeping out at their Fundaments) use to set up their Rumps, and clap their Tails against a wall so long, till they feel the Serpents dead within them.

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