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Show xxxii SYSTEMATIC INDEX. '• Egrets Ditterns Night Herons Ciconia Mycteria Scopus Hians Dramas Tantalus Plata lea LONGIHOSTUES Scolopax Ibis Numenius Scolopax proper Rhyncha:a Limosa Ca.lidris Arenaria Pelidna Cocorli Falcinellns Machetes Eurinorhynchus Ph::Uaropus Strepsila.s Totanus Lobipes Himantopus Recurvirostra MACRODACTYLI Jacana Palamedea Chauna Megapodius Rallus Fulica Gallinula Porpl1yrio Fulica proper Chionis Glareola Phrenicopterus PALMIPEDES BRACIIYPTER.lE Colymbus I '(I • I ' I I I IJ' 377 377 378 378 379 380 380 380 381 381 382 383 383 384 385 386 387 387 388 388 389 389 389 390 390 391 391 393 393 394 394 395 396 396 397 398 399 399 399 399 400 400 401 402 402 403 Podiccps 403 H cliornis 404 Mergus 404 Uria 405 Cephus 405 Alca 406 )?ratercula 406 Alca proper 406 Aptenodytes 407 Aptenodytes proper 407 Catarrhactes 407 Spheniscus 408 LONGIPENNES 408 Procellaria 408 Procellaria proper 409 Puffinus 410 Halodroma 410 Pachyptila 410 Diomedea 411 Larus 411 Goelands 412 Mauves 412 Stercorarius 413 Sterna 413 Noddies 415 Rynchops 415 TOTIP ALMA T 1E 415 Pelecanus 415 Pelecanus proper 415 Phalacrocora:x: 415 Tachypetes 417 Sula 417 Plotus 418 Phreton 418 LAMELLIROSTRES 419 Anas 419 Cygnus 419 Anser 421 Anser proper 421 Bernacles 421 Cereopsis 421 Anas propoc 422 Oidemia 423 Clangula 423 Somateria 424 Rynchaspis 426 Tadorna 426 • •1 Mergus 428 INTRODUC1,ION.· As correct ideas respecting natural history are not very generally formed, it appears necessary to begin by defining its peculiar object, and establishing rigorous limits between it and neighbouring sciencesJ In our language and in most others, the word NATURE is variously employed. At one time it is used to express the qualities a being derives from birth, in opposition to those it may owe to art ; at another, the entire mass of beings which compose the universe; and at a third, the laws which govern those beings. It is in this latter sense particularly that we usually personify nature; and, through respect, use its name for that of its Creator. Physics, or Natural Philosophy, treats of the nature of these three relations, and is eithe·r general or particular. General physics examines abstractedly each of the properties of those movable and extended beings we call bodies. That branch of them styled Dynamics, considers bo'dies· in mass; and proceeding from a very small number of experiments, determines mathematically the laws of equilibrium, and those of motion and of its communication.- Its different divisions are termed Statics, Hydrostatics, Hydrodynamics, Mechanics, &c. &c., according to the nature of the particular bodies whose motions it examines. Optics considers the particular motions of light, whose phenomena, which hitherto nothing but experiment has· been able to determine, are becoming more numerous. Chemistry, another branch of general physics, exposes the laws by which the elementary mol~culcs of bodies act on each Vor... I.-A |