A BIRD WITHOUT WINGS 



There are many birds which cannot fly, and some which have not even wings. One of these 

 (shown above) is the Apteryx of New Zealand, called by the natives kiwi-kiwi. The 

 most superficial observer would at once remark that this bird lacks something, since 

 it reminds one of a man without arms; for the wings are totally absent, and the place 

 where they should be is covered with a close smooth growth of hair-like feathers. It 

 is known that the ancestors of the kiwi had wings, and the problem for evolutionists 

 is how it came to lose them. August Wcismann pointed out that the wings were of no 

 use to the bird, since it lives on the ground and hunts worms by night. It has no need 

 of wings to obtain its food; nor to escape from enemies on the ground, since there are 

 no native mammals except bats in New Zealand. In fact, wings might be rather a 

 hindrance than otherwise to the kiwi in moving quickly through thickets and under- 

 brush. Birds which were bom with defective wings, therefore, were not i)enalized by 

 natural selection; and as variations which would s])oil a complicated structure like a 

 wing are much more frequent than those which would make it more jierfcct, the wings 

 gradually degenerated until thej' became mere rudiments which are externally altogether 

 invisible' Involution works both ways, and causes imj)rovement or degeneration, accord- 

 ing to external circumstances. Photograph by E. R. Sanborn, New York Zoological 

 Society. (Frontispiece.) 



