No one, on seeing a Toucan, can help asking what is the use of
the enormous bill, which, in some species, attains a length of
seven inches, and a width of more than two inches. A few remarks
on this subject may be here introduced. The early naturalists,
having seen only the bill of a Toucan, which was esteemed as a
marvellous production by the virtuosi of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, concluded that the bird must have belonged
to the aquatic and web-footed order, as this contains so many
species of remarkable development of beak, adapted for seizing
fish. Some travvellers also related fabulous stories of Toucans
resorting to the banks of rivers to feed on fish, and these
accounts also encouraged the erroneous views of the habits of the
birds which for a long time prevailed. Toucans, however, are now
well known to be eminently arboreal birds, and to belong to a
group including trogons, parrots, and barbets [Capitoninae, G. R.
Gray.]-- all of whose members are fruit-eaters.
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