“The result of the dissection of the head of the Rhynchops, comparatively with that of the head of the duck, is not what you anticipated.² The facial, or sensitive branches of the fifth pair of nerves, are very small; the third division in particular, is filamentary, and I have not been able to trace it beyond the soft integument at the angles of the mouth. After removing with care, the thin horny covering of the beak, I cannot perceive any trace of those nervous expansions which are so remarkable in the lamelli-rostral aquatic birds; and which in them supply the tooth-like process, and soft marginal covering of the mandibles. Nevertheless, when we remember how sensitive a hair is, through the nerve situated at its base, though without any in its substance, it would not be safe to deny altogether, a sensitive faculty in the beak of the Rhynchops.”