CHAPTEE II. 



THE PLUMAGE AND FLIGHT OF BIRDS. 



The power of flight is enjoyed, not only by the bii-ds that migrate to distant latitudes, but 

 by those which subsist on the seeds and insects sought on the ground, and weave their 

 nests among the branches of trees, as well as by the multitudes dwelling on the surface of 

 the ocean, and gaining there appropriate sustenance. Yet, while it is a conunon endow- 

 ment to leave the earth, the trees, the marsh or the sea, it is not alilie in all ; for some 

 birds are untiring on the wing, while the flight of others proves speedily exhausting. 

 Equally varying is the character of their flight ; so that an experienced natimiUst 

 will point out a bird -v^-ith which he has become acquainted in its natural state 

 from its flight alone, dependent as it is on pinions exquisitely adapted to its actual 

 condition. 



Every variation we can discover has its specific object and use. Tlic wag-tail, pursuing 

 on the ground what the swallow docs in the air, seems incapable of keeping itself at 

 rest ; — ever in motion, because it is not so easy to begin to move from a state of inaction ; 

 and thence, probably, the length of its apparent siqicilluity of tail. To the sea-birds, 

 which neither d'wc nor swim, long flights and great duration are necessary, because their 

 food is often rare, wide apart, and far, also, from their homes. Hence the great and 

 untirmg powers of the gull and the gannet, and especially of the alb;itross, the velocity of 

 which is said to amount to a himcbed miles in an hour. 



Audubon states that pigeons have been killed, in tlu' neighboui'hood of New York, 

 with tlieir crojjs full of rice, which they must have collected in the fields of Georgia or 

 Carolina, these districts being the nearest in which tliey could have procured a supply of 

 this land of food. As their power of digestion is great, and (hey wiU decompose food 

 entirely in twelve hours, ih(-y must have travelled, in this instaiue, between three and 

 four hundred miles in six hours, which shows their speed to lie, at ;in average, of about 

 one mile in a minute. A velocity such as tliis would enable one of these birds to visit the 

 continent of Murope in less than three days. 



The plumage, in all cases, is cxcpiisitely suited to the (•ircumstanccs of the creature which 

 it covers and perhaps adorns. There, for instance, is a wing rather adapted to aid the 

 bird in running than flying, as it scours along in the desert, and leaves its foe far behind. 

 See ! how soft and loose it is, utterly di'stitute of compactness and vigour. Observe 

 another : it is fuU, loose, and delicately soft, iiresenting no sharp or rigid edges to the air, 

 and therefore no resistance, but yielding prom])tly to every breath ; it is that of tli(> owl, 

 one of the. birds of night, which pounces stealthily and noiselessly on its pny. And to 

 turn only to another bird : its feathers are close and rigid, anil have a surface like that of 

 burnished metal ; tlu? wings are long and pointed, and the tail is forked, and as elastir 

 as it is iirni : it is the humming-bird, darting hither and thither, and that with a rajjidity 

 whicli alnvist elurh's (he eve. 



