THE BUILDING OF A BIRD 35 



Sparrow can say ' Peabod}',' and some kinds of Parrots 

 can repeat whole sentences so as to be understood. 

 That is another thing in which birds' beaks are like 

 our mouths. Now look again — can you see anything 

 else about the Sparrow's beak? " 



" I see a pair of little holes at the root of the upper 

 mandible," said Rap. 



" Well, those are the nostrils I " said the Doctor. 

 " Birds must breathe, like ourselves, and when the beak 

 is shut they breathe through the nostrils." 



" So do I," said Dodo ; and then she pursed up her 

 pretty red lips tightly, breathing quite hard through 

 her nose. '' I do think," she said, when she had finished 

 this performance, " birds have faces, with all the things 

 in them that we have — there are the eyes, too, on each 

 side, like people's eyes, only they look sideways and 

 not in front. But I don't see their ears. Have birds 

 any ears, Uncle Roy?" 



" I can show you this SparroAv's ears. See here," 

 said the Doctor, who had run the point of his penknife 

 under a little package of feathers on one side of the 

 back of the Sparrow's head, and lifted them up; " what 

 does that look like?" 



'^ It's a hole in the skin that runs into the head," said 

 Nat. '' Can birds hear through that? " 



" Of course they can. Ears of all animals are made 

 to hear with. This Sparrow can hear quite as well as 

 you can, Nat. Now think, children, how many things 

 we have found about this Sparrow's head that are quite 

 like our own, — ears, eyes, nose, mouth, and tongue, — 

 only there are no li})s or teeth, because the horny beak, 

 with its hard edges and sharp point, answers both for 



