IBIS.
GLOSSY IBIS. BAY IBIS. GREEN IBIS.
Ibis falcinellus,
Ibis ignea,
Tantalus falcinellus,
Nummiüs virtáis,
FLEMING. SELHY.
STEPHENS.
PENNANT. MONTAGU.
BRESSON.
Ibis—The Greek name of a bird. Falcindlus. Falx—A hook, from the
shape of the bill.
THIS Ibis, though of a different species from that which, worshipped
by the Egyptians of old, obtained thence the name of sacred, appears
to have been also regarded by them with some degree of veneration,
as its remains arc found with those of the other bird, preserved still,
after the lapse of so many thousands of years in the mummies of the
catacombs.
I n Europe, it occurs on its travels in the islands of the Archipelago
of Greece, and in .Sicily, Sardinia, Italy, Switzerland, France, Holland,
Turkey, Hungary, Poland, and the southern parts of Russia. It is
also included among the birds of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, and
has been seen, according to Wagler, in Iceland. It belongs likewise
to northern Africa—in Egypt, and again southwards, even to the Cape
of Good Hope. In Asia, too, in India, in the Dukkun; in Persia,
Syria, Thibet, and the districts between the Black Sea and the Caspian
Sea, and in the islands of Sunda and Java, and others. Lastly, in
America, examples have, it is said, occurred; several in the United
States, and in Canada, and in Mexico it exists in vast numbers,
according to Audubon; as also in Florida, and the Brazils, but the
Prince of Canino considers the species as a different one, and thinks
that, this continent has been wrongly assigned to the bird at present
under consideration.
One was obtained in Dorsetshire, in 1839; in Norfolk, a pair were
shot at the mouth of the Norwich river, September 13th., 182-4; there
VOL. iv. 2 A