indiscriminate appetites with the animal described in the last chapter; if left at liberty in a state of tameness it will pursue the poultry, and destroy every living thing that it has strength to conquer. Though it is playful with its keeper, yet it seems obstinately bent against receiving any instruction, and neither threats nor caresses can induce it to practice any arts to which it is not naturally inclined. When it sleeps it rolls itself up in a lump, and in that position often continues for fourteen or fifteen hours together.

CHAP. XIV.

THE ANT BEAR.

There are many animals that live upon ants in Africa and America; the pangolin or scaly lizard of Guinea may be considered among this number; but there are a greater variety in America which make those minute insects their only subsistence. Though they are of different figures and sizes, yet in general they go under one common name of the "ant-bear." The peculiar length and slenderness of their snout, their singular appetites, and their manner of taking their prey, strike us too strongly to attend to the minute differences of their size or form.

They have been classed by Mr. Buffon into the "larger tamandua," the "smaller tamandua," and the "anteater." The largest of this kind is four feet long from the tip of the snout to the insertion of the tail; their legs are short, and armed with four strong claws; their tail is long and tufted, and the animal often throws it on its back like the squirrel. The second of this kind is not above eighteen inches long, the tail is without hair, and it sweeps the ground as the animal moves. The ant-eater, which is the third variety, is still smaller than either of the former, as it is not above seven inches from the tip of the snout to the insertion of the tail. The two former are of a brown dusky colour, but this is of a beautiful redish mixed with yellow; though they differ in figure, they all resemble each other in one peculiarity, which is the extreme slenderness of their snout and the amazing length of their tongue.

The snout is produced in so disproportionate a manner, that the length of it makes near a fourth part of the whole figure. A horse has one of the longest heads of any animal we know; and yet the ant-bear has one above twice as long in proportion to its body. The snout of this animal is almost round and cylindrical; it is extremely slender, and is scarce thicker near the eyes than at its extremity. The mouth is very small, the nostrils are very close to each other, the eyes are little in proportion to the length of the nose, the neck is short, the tongue is extremely long, slender, and flatted on both sides; this it keeps generally doubled up in the mouth, and is the only instrument by which it finds subsistence; for the whole of this tribe are entirely without teeth, and find safety only in the remoteness and security of their

retreat.

If we examine through the various regions of the earth, we shall find that all the most active, sprightly, and useful quadrupeds have been gathered round man, and either served his pleasures or still maintained their independence by their vigilance, their cunning, or their industry. It is in the remote solitudes that we are to look for the helpless, the deformed, and the monstrous births of Nature. These wretched animals being incapable of defending themselves, either by their agility or their natural arms, fall a prey to every creature that attacks them; they therefore retire for safety into the darkest forests or the most desert mountains, where none of the bolder or swifter animals choose to reside.

It may well be supposed that an animal so helpless as

the ant-bear-with legs too short to fit it for flight, and unprovided with teeth to give it a power of resistanceis neither numerous nor often seen; its retreats are in the most barren and uncultivated parts of South America. It is a native only of the new continent, and entirely unknown to the old. It lives chiefly in the woods, and hides itself under the fallen leaves. It seldom ventures from its retreat, and the industry of an hour supplies it with sufficient food for several days together. Its manner of procuring its prey is one of the most singular in all natural history; as its name implies, it lives entirely upon ants and insects; these, in the countries where it is bred, are found in the greatest abundance, and often build themselves hills five or six feet high, where they live in community. When this animal approaches an ant-hill it creeps slowly forward on its belly, taking every precaution to keep itself concealed, till it comes within a proper distance of the place where it intends to make its banquet; there, lying closely along at its length, it thrusts forth its round red tongue, which is often two feet long, across the path of these busy insects, and there lets it lie motionless for several minutes together. The ants of that country, some of which are half an inch long, considering it as a piece of flesh accidentally thrown before them, come forth and swarm upon it in great numbers, but wherever they touch they stick; for this instrument is covered with a slimy fluid, which, like bird-lime, entangles every creature that lights upon it. When, therefore, the antbear has found a sufficient number for one morsel, it instantly draws in the tongue, and devours them all in a moment; after which it still continues in its position practising the same arts until its hunger is entirely appeased; it then retires to its hiding-place once more, where it continues in indolent existence till again excited by the calls of hunger.

Such is the luxurious life of a creature that seems of all others the most helpless and deformed. It finds safety in its hiding-places from its enemies, and an ample supply in some neighbouring ant-hill for all its appe tites. As it only tries to avoid its pursuers, it is seldom discovered by them; yet helpless as this animal is, when driven to an extremity, though without teeth, it will fight with its claws with great obstinacy. With these arms alone it has often been found to oppose the dog, and even the jaguar. It throws itself upon its back, fastens upon its enemy with all its claws, sticks with great strength and perseverance, and even after killing its invader, which is sometimes the case, does not quit its hold, but remains fastened upon it with vindictive desperation.

Of the sloth there are two different kinds, distinguished from each other by their claws; the one, which in its native country is called the "unan," having only two claws upon each foot, and being without a tail; the other, which is called the "ai," having a tail and three claws upon each foot. The unan has the snout longer, the ears more apparent, and the fur very different from the other. It differs also in the number of its ribs, this having forty-six, while the ai has but twentyeight. These differences, however, which, though very apparent, have been but little regarded in the description of two animals which so strongly resemble each other in the general outlines of their figure, in their ap petites, and their helpless formation.

They are both, therefore, described under the common appellation of the sloth," and their habitudes well deserve our wonder and curiosity. Nature seems

cramped and constrained in their formation; other animals are often indolent from choice-these are slow from necessity; the ai, from which I shall take my de scription, and from which the other differs only in the slight particulars above mentioned, and in being rather more active, is about the size of a badger. Its fur is coarse and staring, somewhat resembling dried grass; the tail very short, and scarce appearing; the mouth extending from ear to ear; the eye dull and heavy; the feet armed with three claws each, and made so short and set on so awkwardly that a few paces is often the journey of a week; but though the feet are short, they are still longer than its legs, and these proceed from the body in such an oblique direction that the sole of the foot seldom touches the ground. When the animal, therefore, is compelled to make a step forward, it scrapes on the back of the nails along the surface, and, wheeling the limbs circularly about, yet still touching the ground, it at length places its foot in a progressive position; the other three limbs are all brought about with the same difficulty; and thus it is seen to move not above three feet in an hour. In fact, this poor creature seldom changes place but by constraint, and when impelled by the severest stings of hunger.

The sloth seems to be the meanest and most ill-formed of all those animals that chew the cud; it lives entirely upon vegetable food, on the leaves, the fruit, and the flowers of trees, and often even on the very bark when nothing else is left on the tree for its subsistence. Like all other ruminant animals it has four stomachs; and these requiring a large share of provision to supply them, it generally strips a tree of all its verdure in less than a fortnight. Still, however, it keeps aloft, unwilling to descend while anything remains that can serve it for food; it therefore falls to devouring the bark, and thus in a short time it kills the tree upon which it found its support. Thus destitute of provisions above, and crawling slowly from branch to branch, in hopes of finding something still left, it is at last obliged to encounter all the dangers that attend it below. Though it is formed by Nature for climbing a tree with great pain and difficulty, yet it is utterly unable to descend; it therefore is obliged to drop from the branches to the ground, and as it is incapable of exerting itself to break the violence of its descent, it drops like a shapeless, heavy mass, and feels no small shock in the fall. There, after remaining some time torpid, it prepares for a journey to some neighbouring tree; but this of all migrations is the most tedious, dangerous, and painful; it often takes a week in crawling to a tree not fifty yards distant; it moves with imperceptible slowness, and often baits by the way. All motions seem to torture it, every step it takes it sets forth a most plaintive, melancholy cry, which, from some distant similitude to the human voice, excites a kind of disgust mixed with pity. This plaintive sound seems its chief defence; few quadrupeds appear willing to interrupt its progress either that the flesh is offensive, or that they are terrified at its cries. When at length they reach their destined tree, they mount it with much greater ease than when they moved upon the plain. They fall to with famished appetite, and, as before, destroy the very source that supplies them.

How far these may be considered as the unfinished productions of Nature I will not take upon me to determine; if we measure their happiness by our sensations, nothing, it is certain, can be more miserable; but it is probable, considered with regard to themselves, they may have some stores of comfort unknown to us, which may set them on a level with some other inferior ranks of the creation; if a part of their life be exposed to pain and labour, it is compensated by a larger portion of plenty, indolence, and safety. In fact, they are formed very differently from all other quadrupeds, and it is probable they have different enjoyments. Like birds, they have but one common vent for the purposes of propagation,

excrement, and urine. Like the tortoise, which they resemble in the slowness of their motion, they continue to live some time after their nobler parts are wounded, or even taken away. They bear the marks of all those homely-formed animals that, like rude machines, are not easily discomposed.

Its note, according to Kircher, is an ascending and descending hexachord, which it utters only by night; its look is so piteous as to move compassion; it is also accompanied with tears, that dissuade every body from injuring so wretched a being. Its abstinence from food is remarkably powerful; one that had fastened itself by its feet to a pole, and was so suspended across two beams, remained forty days without meat, drink, or sleep; the strength of its feet is so great, that whatsoever it seizes on cannot possibly be freed from its claws. A dog was let loose at the above-mentioned animal, taken from the pole; after some time the sloth laid hold of the dog with its feet, and held him four days, till he perished with hunger.

CHAP. XVI.

THE GERBUA.

This animal as little resembles a quadruped as that which has been described in a former chapter. If we should suppose a bird divested of its feathers and walking upon its legs, it might give us some idea of its figure. It has four feet indeed, but in running or resting it never makes use of any but the hinder. The number of legs, however, do not much contribute to any animal's speed; and the gerbua (though, properly speaking, furnished but with two) is one of the swiftest creatures in the world.

The gerbua is not above the size of a large rat, and its head is sloped somewhat in the manner of a rabbit; the teeth are also formed like those of the rat kind, there being two cutting teeth in each jaw; it has a very long tail, tufted at the end; the head, the back, and the sides are covered with large ash-coloured soft hair; the breast and belly are whitish. But what most deserves our attention in the formation of this little animal is the legs; the fore-legs are not an inch long, with four claws and a thumb upon each, while the hinder legs are two inches and a quarter, and exactly resemble those of a bird, there being but three toes, the middlemost of which is longest.

The gerbua is found in Egypt, Barbary, Palestine, and the deserts between Busserah and Aleppo; its hindlegs, as was said before, are only used in running, while the fore-paws, like those of a squirrel, grasp its food, and in some measure perform the office of hands. It is often seen by travellers as they pass along the deserts, crossing their way, jumping six or eight feet at every bound, and going so swiftly that scarce any other quadruped is able to overtake it. They are a lively, harmless race of animals, living entirely upon vegetables, and burrowing like rabbits in the ground. Mr. Pennant tells us of two that were lately brought to London, that burrowed almost through the brick wall of the room where they were kept; they came out of their hole at night for food, and when caught were much fatter and sleeker than when confined to their burrows. A variety of this animal is also found in Siberia and Circassia, and is most probably common enough over all Asia. They are more expert diggers than even the rabbit itself; and when pursued for a long time, if they cannot escape by their swiftness they instantly try to make a hole in the ground, in which they often bury themselves deep enough to find security before their pursuers come up. Their burrows in some places are so thick as to be dangerous to travellers, the horses

perpetually falling in them. It is a provident little animal, and lays up for the winter. It cuts grass in heaps of a foot square, which when dried it carries into its burrow, therewith to serve for food, and to keep its young warm during the rigours of the winter.

But of all animals of this kind, that which was first discovered and described by Mr. Banks is the most extraordinary. He calls it the "kangaroo;" and though, from its general outline and the most striking peculiarities of its figure it greatly resembles the gerbua, yet it entirely differs if we consider its size, or those minute distinctions which direct the makers of systems in assorting the general ranks of Nature.

The largest of the gerbua kind which are to be found in the ancient continent do not exceed the size of a rabbit. The kangaroo of New Holland, where it is only to be found, is often known to weigh above sixty pounds, and must consequently be as large as a sheep. Although the skin of that which was stuffed and brought home by Mr. Banks was not much above the size of a hare, yet it was greatly superior to any of the gerbua kind that have been hitherto known, and very different in many particulars. The snout of the gerbua, as has been said, is short and round-that of the discovered animal long and slender; the teeth also entirely differ; for as the gerbua has but two cutting teeth in each jaw, making four in all, this animal, beside its cutting teeth, has four canine teeth also; but what makes a more striking peculiarity is the formation of its lower jaw, which, as the ingenious discoverer supposes, is divided into two parts, which open and shut like a pair of scissors, and cut grass-probably this animal's principal food. The head, neck, and shoulders are very small in proportion to the other parts of the body; the tail is nearly as long as the body, thick near the rump, and tapering towards the end; the skin is covered with a short fur, except the head and ears, which bear a slight resemblance to those of the hair. We are not told, however, from the formation of its stomach, to what class of quadrupeds it belongs; from its eating grass, which it has been seen to do, one would be apt to rank it among the ruminant animals; but from the canine teeth which it is found to have, we may on the other hand suppose it to bear some relation to the carnivorous. Upon the whole, however, it can be classed with none more properly than with animals of the gerbua kind, as its hind-legs are so much longer than the fore; it also moves precisely in the same manner, taking great bounds of ten or twelve feet at a time, and thus sometimes escaping even the fleetest greyhound with which Mr. Banks pursued it. One of them that was killed proved to be good food; but a second, which weighed eighty-four pounds, but was not yet come to its full growth, was found to be much inferior.

With this last-described and last-discovered animal I shall conclude the history of quadrupeds, which of all parts of natural knowledge seems to have been described the most accurately. As these, from their figure as well as their sagacity, bear the nearest resemblance to man, and from their uses or enmities are the most respectable parts of the inferior creation, so it was his interest and his pleasure to make himself acquainted with their true history. It is probable, therefore, that time, which enlarges the sphere of our knowledge in other parts of learning, can add but very little to this. The addition of a new quadruped to the catalogue already known is of no small consequence, and happens but seldom; for the number of all is so few, that wherever a new one is found it becomes an object worthy our best attention. It may take refuge in its native deserts from our pursuit, but not from our curiosity.

But it is different with the inferior ranks of creation; the classes of birds, of fishes, and of insects are much more numerous, and equally less known. The quadruped is possessed of no arts of escaping which we are

not able to overcome; but the bird removes itself by its swiftness-the fishes find protection in their native element—and insects are secured in their minuteness, numbers, and variety. Of all these, therefore, we have hut a very inadequate catalogue, and though the list be already very large, yet every hour is adding to their extent.

In fact, all knowledge is pleasant only as the object of it contributes to render man happy; and the services of quadrupeds being so very necessary to him in every situation, he is particularly interested in their history: without their aid, what a wretched and forlorn creature would he have been! the principal part of his food, his clothing, and his amusements are derived wholly from them; and he may be considered as a great lord, sometimes cherishing his humble dependents, and sometimes terrifying the refractory, to contribute to his delight and convenience.

The horse and the ass, the elephant, the camel, the lama, and the rein-deer, contribute to ease his fatigues, and to give him that swiftness which he wants from Nature. By their assistance he changes place without labour; he attains health without weariness; his pride is enlarged by the elegance of equipage, and other animals are pursued with a certainty of success. It were happy indeed if, while converting these quadrupeds to his own benefit, he had not turned them to the destruction of his fellow-creatures; he has employed some of them for the purposes of war, and they have conformed to his noxious ambition with but too fatal an obedience.

The cow, the sheep, the deer, and all their varieties, are necessary to him, though in a different manner. Their flesh makes the principal luxuries of his table, and their wool or skins the chief ornament of his person. Even those nations that are forbid to touch anything that has life cannot wholly dispense with their assistance. The milk of these animals makes a principal part of the food of every country, and often repairs those constitutions that have been broken by disease or intemperance.

The dog, the cat, and the ferret may be considered as having deserted from their fellow-quadrupeds to enlist themselves under the conduct and protection of man. At his command they exert all their services against such animals as they are capable of destroying, and follow them into places where he himself wants abilities to pursue.

As there is thus a numerous tribe that he has taken into protection, and that supplies his necessities and amusements, so there is also a still more numerous one that wages an unequal combat against him, and thus calls forth his courage and his industry. Were it no for the lion, the tiger, the panther, the rhinoceros, and the bear, he would scarce know his own powers, and the superiority of human art over brutal fierceness. These serve to excite, and put his nobler passions into motion. He attacks them in their retreat, faces them with resolution, and seldom fails of coming off with a victory. He thus becomes hardier and better in the struggle, and learns to know and to value his own superiority.

As the last-mentioned animals are called forth by his boldest efforts, so the numerous tribe of the smaller vermin kind excite his continual vigilance and caution; his various arts and powers have been nowhere more manifest than in the extirpation of those that multiply with such prodigions fecundity Neither their agility nor their minuteness can secure them from his pursuits and though they may infest, they are seldom found materially to injure him.

In this manner we see that not only human want is supplied, but that human wit is sharpened by the humblest partners of man in the creation. By this we see that not only their benefits but their depredations are useful, and that it has wisely pleased Providence to place us like victors in a subdued country, where we have all the benefit of conquest without being so secure as to run in the sloth and excesses of a certain and un

disturbed possession. It appears, therefore, that those writers who are continually finding immediate benefit in every production see but half way into the general system of Nature. Experience must every hour inform

us that all animals are not formed for our use; but we may be equally well assured, that those conveniences which we want from their friendship are well repaid by that vigilance which we procure from their enmity.

BIRDS

BOOK I.-CHAP. I.

INTRODUCTION.-We are now come to a beautiful and loquacious race of animals, that embellish our forests, amuse our walks, and exclude solitude from our most shady retirements. From these man has nothing to fear; their pleasures, their desires, and even their animosities, only serve to enliven the general picture of Nature, and give harmony to meditation.

No part of Nature appears destitute of inhabitants. The woods, the waters, the depths of the earth, have their respective tenants; while the yielding air, and those tracts of seeming space where man never can ascend, are also passed through by multitudes of the most beautiful beings of the creation.

Every order and rank of animals seems fitted for its situation in life, but none more apparently than birds; they share in common with the stronger race of quadrupeds the vegetable spoils of the earth, are supplied with swiftness to compensate for the want of force, and have a faculty of ascending into the air to avoid that power which they cannot oppose.

The bird seems formed entirely for a life of escape, and every part of the anatomy of the animal seems calculated for a life of swiftness. As it is designed to rise upon air, all its parts are proportionably light, and expand a large surface without solidity.

In a comparative view with man, their formation seems much ruder and more imperfect; and they are in general found incapable of the docility even of quadrupeds. Indeed, what great degree of sagacity can be expected in animals whose eyes are almost as large as their brain? However, though they fall below the quadrupeds in the scale of Nature, and are less imitative of human endowments, yet they hold the next rank, and far surpass fishes and insects, both in the structure of their bodies and in their sagacity.

As in mechanics the most curious instruments are generally the most complicated, so it is in anatomy. The body of man presents the greatest variety on dissection; quadrupeds, less perfectly formed, discover their defects in the simplicity of their conformation; the mechanism of birds is still less complex; fishes are furnished with fewer organs still; while insects, more imperfect than all, seem to fill up the chasm that separates animal from vegetable nature. Of man, the most perfect animal, there are but three or four species; of quadrupeds the kinds are more numerous; birds are more various still; fishes yet more; but insects afford so very great a variety, that they elude the search of the most inquisitive

pursuer.

Quadrupeds, as was said, have some distant resemblance in their internal structure with man; but that

of birds is entirely dissimilar. As they seem chiefly formed to inhabit the empty regions of air, all their parts are adapted to their destined situation. It will be proper, therefore, before I give a general history of birds to enter into a slight detail of their anatomy and conformation.

As to their external parts, they seem surprisingly adapted for swiftness of motion. The shape of their body is sharp before, to pierce and make way through the air; it then rises by a gentle swelling to its bulk, and falls off in an expansive tail, which helps to keep it buoyant, while the fore-parts are cleaving the air by their sharpness. From this conformation they have often been compared to a ship making its way through water; the trunk of the body answers to the hold, the head to the prow, the tail to the rudder, and the wings to the oars; from whence the poets have adopted the metaphor of "remigium alarum," when they described the wavy motion of a bird in flight.

What we are called upon next to admire in the external formation of birds is the neat position of the feathers, lying all one way, answering at once the purposes of warmth, speed, and security. They mostly tend backward, and are laid over one another in an exact and regular order, armed with warm and soft down next the body, and more strongly fortified and curiously closed externally to fence off the injuries of the weather. But, lest the feathers should spoil by their violent attrition against the air, or imbibe the moisture of the atmosphere, the animal is furnished with a gland behind, containing a proper quantity of oil, which can be pressed out by the bird's bill, and laid smoothly over every feather that wants to be dressed for the occasion. This gland is situated on the rump, and furnished with an opening or excretory duct, about which grows a small tuft of feathers somewhat like a painter's pencil. When, therefore, the feathers are shattered or rumpled, the bird, turning its head backwards, with the bill catches hold of the gland, and, pressing it, forces out the oily substance, with which it annoints the disjointed parts of the feathers, and, drawing them out with great assiduity, recomposes and places them in due order, by which they unite more closely together. Such poultry, however, as live for the most part under cover are not furnished with so large a stock of fluid as those birds that reside in the open air. The feathers of a hen, for instance, are pervious to every shower; on the contrary, swans, geese, ducks, and all such as Nature has directed to live upon the water, have their feathers dressed with oil from the very first day of their leaving the shell. Thus their stock of fluid is equal to the necessity of its consumption. Their very flesh contracts a flavour from it, which renders it in some very rancid, so as to make it

utterly unfit for food; however, though it injures the flesh it improves the feathers for all the domestic purposes to which they are usually converted.

Nor are the feathers with which birds are covered less an object of admiration. The shaft of every feather is made proportionably strong, but hollow below for strength and lightness, and above filled with a pith to feed the growth of the vane or beard that springs from the shaft of the feather on either side. All these feathers are placed generally according to their length and strength, so that the largest and strongest feathers in flight have the greatest share of duty. The vane or beard of the feather is formed with equal contrivance and care. It consists not of one continued membranebecause, if this were broken, it could not easily be repaired; but is composed of many layers, each somewhat in itself resembling a feather, and lying against each other in close conjunction. Towards the shaft of the feather these layers are broad, and of a semicircular form, to serve for strength, and for the closer grafting them one against another when in action. Towards the outer part of the vane these layers grow slender and taper, to be more light. On their under-side they are thin and smooth, but their upper outer edge is parted into two hairy edges, each side having a different sort of hairs, broad at bottom and slender and bearded above. By this mechanism the hooked beards of one layer always lie next the straight beards of the next, and by that means lock and hold each other.

The next object that comes under consideration in contemplating an animal that flies is the wing, the in strument by which this wonderful progression is performed. In such birds as fly, they are usually placed at that part of the body which serves to poise the whole, and support it in a fluid that at first seems so much lighter than itself. They answer to the fore-legs in quadrupeds, and at the extremity of this they have a certain finger-like appendix, which is usually called the "bastard-wing." This instrument of flight is furnished with quills, which differ from the common feathers only in their size being larger, and also from their springing from the deeper part of the skin, their shafts lying almost close to the bone. The beards of these quills are broad on one side and more narrow on the other, both which contribute to the progressive motion of the bird and the closeness of the wing. The manner in which most birds avail themselves of these at first is thus:-They quit the earth with a bound, in order to have room for flapping with the wing: when they have room for this, they strike the body of air beneath the wing with a violent motion, and with the whole under surface of the same; but then, to avoid striking the air with equal violence on the upper side as they rise, the wing is instantly contraeted; so that the animal rises by the impulse till it spreads the wing for a second blow. For this reason we always see birds choose to rise against the wind, because they have thus a greater body of air on the under than the upper side of the wing. For these reasons, also, large fowls do not rise easily; both because they have not sufficient room at first for the motion of their wings, and because the body of air does not lie so directly under the wing as they rise.

In order to move the wings, all birds are furnished with two strong pectoral muscles, which lie on each side of the breast-bone. The pectoral muscles of quadrupeds are trifling in comparison to those of birds. In quadrupeds, as well as in man, the muscles which move the thighs and hinder parts of the body are by far the most powerful, while those of the arms are feeble; but in birds, which make use of their wings, the contrary obtains the pectoral muscles that move the wings or arms are of enormous strength, while those of the thighs are weak and slender. By means of these a bird can move its wings with a degree of strength which, compared to

the animal's size, is almost incredible. The flap of a swan's wing would break a man's leg; and a similar blow from an eagle has been known to lay a man dead in an instant. Such, consequently, is the force of the wing and such its lightness as to be inimitable by Art. No machines that human skill can contrive are capable of giving such force to so light an apparatus. The art of flying, therefore, that has so often and so fruitlessly been sought after, must, it is feared, for ever be unattainable since as man increases the force of his flying machine he must be obliged to increase its weight also. In all birds, except nocturnal ones, the head is smaller, and bears less proportion to the body than in quadru peds, that it may more readily divide the air in flying, and make way for the body so as to render its passage more easy. Their eyes, also, are more flat and depressed than in quadrupeds; a circle of small plates of bone, placed scalewise under the outer coat of the organ, encompasses the pupil on each to strengthen and defend it from injuries. Beside this, birds have a kind of skin called the nictitating membrane, with which, like a veil, they can at pleasure cover their eyes though their eyelids continue open. This membrane takes its rise from the greater or more obtuse corner of the eye, and serves to wipe, cleanse, and probably to moisten its surface. The eyes, though they outwardly appear but small, yet separately each almost equals the brain; whereas in man the brain is more than twenty times larger than the orbit of the eye. Nor is this organ in birds less adapted for vision by a particular expansion of the optic nerve, which renders the impressions of external objects more vivid and distinct.

From this conformation of the eye, it follows that the sense of seeing in birds is infinitely superior to that of other animals. Indeed, this piercing sight seems necessary to the creature's support and safety. Were this organ blunter, from the rapidity of the bird's motion it would be apt to strike against every object in its way; and it could scarcely find subsistence unless possessed of a power to discern its food from above with astonishing sagacity. A hawk, for instance, perceives a lark at a distance which neither men nor dogs could spy; a kite, from an almost imperceptible height in the clouds, darts down on its prey with the most unerring aim. The sight of birds, therefore, exceeds what we know in most other animals, and excels them both in strength and precision.

All birds want the external ear standing out from the head; they are only furnished with holes that convey sounds to the auditory canal. It is true, indeed, that the horned owl and one or two more birds seem to have external ears; but what bears that resemblance are only feathers sticking out on each side of the head, but no way necessary to the sense of hearing. It is probable, however, that the feathers encompassing the ear-holes in birds supply the defect of the exterior ear, and collect sounds to be transinitted to the internal sensory. The extreme delicacy of this organ is easily proved by the readiness with which birds learn tunes or repeat words, and the great exactness of their pronunciation.

The sense of smelling seems not less vivid in the generality of birds. Many of them " wind" their prey at an immense distance, while others are equally protected by this sense against their insidious pursuers. In deeoys, where ducks are caught, the men who attend them universally keep a piece of turf burning near their mouths, upon which they breathe lest the fowl should smell them, and consequently fly away. The univer sality of this practice puts the necessity of it beyond a doubt, and proves the extreme delicacy of the sense of smelling, at least in this species of the feathered creation.

Next to the parts for flight, let us view the legs and feet ministering to motion. They are both made light for the easier transportation through the air. The toes