CHAPTER X 

 BEAKS AND BILLS 



TE a man's hands and arms tightly behind his 

 back, stand him on his feet, and tell him that 

 he must hereafter find and prepare his food, 

 build his house, defend himself from his enemies and 

 perform all the business of life in such a position, and 

 what a pitiable object he would present! Yet this is not 

 unlike what birds have to do. As we have seen, almost 

 every form of vegetable and animal life is used as food 

 by one or another of the species. Birds have most in- 

 tricately built homes, and their methods of defence are 

 to be numbered by the score; the care of their delicate 

 plumage alone would seem to necessitate many and varied 

 instruments: yet all this is made possible, and chiefly 

 executed, by one small portion of the bird — its bill or 

 beak. 



If one will spend an afternoon at a zoological park, 

 or with any good collection of live birds, watching the 

 w^ays in which the bills of the various species are used, 

 one will not boast of his own accomplishments, when 

 it is realized how much more, comparatively, the bird is 

 able to achieve with the aid of two projecting pieces of 



horn. 



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