CHAPTER III 



EVIDENCE OF RELATIONSHIP TO REPTILES 



AFTER all that has been said about the great differ- 

 ences between birds and reptiles, the reader may begin 

 to think that the points of resemblance are few and 

 small, and that the relationship after all may be only 

 a distant one. In reality the evidence of a compar- 

 atively near relationship is convincing. But it must 

 not be expected that the resemblances should be 

 as striking as the differences. The latter are due 

 mainly, perhaps entirely, to natural selection working 

 during long ages and gradually suiting the bird's 

 structure to new conditions of life and changing habits. 

 The metamorphosis produced is so great that to the 

 untrained eye the bird has been altered almost beyond 

 recognition. The points of resemblance are ancestral 

 peculiarities that have survived all changes of habit. 

 Not being connected, as a rule, with the new and 

 more brilliant life of the ennobled race, it is only to be 

 expected that they should be comparatively incon- 

 spicuous or of the nature of mere rudiments. Before 

 mentioning these marks of reptilian origin it will be 



