Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they are listed at the end of the text. Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Project Gutenberg has the other two volumes of this work. Volume II: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44057. Volume III: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44058. * * * * * Zoological Illustrations, OR ORIGINAL FIGURES AND DESCRIPTIONS OF NEW, RARE, OR INTERESTING ANIMALS, SELECTED CHIEFLY FROM THE CLASSES OF Ornithology, Entomology, and Conchology, AND ARRANGED ACCORDING TO THEIR APPARENT AFFINITIES. BY WM. SWAINSON, ESQ., F.R.S., F.L.S. ASSISTANT COMMISSARY GENERAL TO H. M. FORCES. CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF PARIS; HONORARY MEMBER OF THE HISTORIC SOCIETY OF NEW YORK; MEMBER OF THE WERNERIAN SOCIETY, &c. &c. &c. VOL. I. SECOND SERIES. London: PRINTED BY R. HAVELL, JUN. NEWMAN STREET. PUBLISHED BY BALDWIN AND CRADOCK, PATERNOSTER ROW. 1829. * * * * * * TO MRS. CORRIE, OF WOODVILLE, NEAR BIRMINGHAM. ---- MY DEAR MADAM, Allow me, in dedicating this volume of Illustrations to you, to evince my respect and friendship for one whose talents shun publicity. It may have a beneficial influence on the rising generation, to know, that a highly cultivated understanding, and varied accomplishments, are not inconsistent with a perfect discharge of all the social duties. And that a mind stored with knowledge, and imbued with Religion, is an effectual antidote to the cheerless influence of debilitated health. That these, my Zoological _Recreations_, may in your opinion, contribute to the great end which the naturalist should ever keep in view, the developement of the harmonies of Creation, and the discovery of the natural system, is the hope of, MY DEAR MADAM, Your obliged and sincere Friend, WILLIAM SWAINSON. * * * * * * PREFACE. ---- The execution of the Zoological drawings now published, have been to us an agreeable relaxation from severer studies; and the concise descriptions by which they are accompanied, are intended to convey, in a condensed and popular form, the partial result of more extended investigations. Species are the objects of which the whole fabric of animated nature is composed, and their respective properties must be investigated, before their natural combinations can be understood. Their delineation is therefore highly important. Figures bring before us objects which cannot always be understood by words; while if faithfully executed, they possess the same value as every period of time; for nature is unchangeable.