Tails 



419 



Long-tailed Fowl — a breed of birds in which, by artificial 

 stimulation, such perhaps as periodical pulling of the 

 feathers or else retardation of moult, has produced, in the 

 cocks, tails from twelve to twenty feet in length. This 

 process dates back, in Corea at least, to a.d. 1000, and 

 necessitates keeping the birds continually upon high 

 perches, or else wrapping the 

 feathers carefully in paper. 

 The arrangement of feathers 

 in this artificially induced 

 character is duplicated in 

 nature in the Paradise Why- 

 dah-finch mentioned above. 



In both the male and fe- 

 male Peacock Pheasant the 



tail is quite long and the 

 feathers are decorated with 

 beautiful iridescent " eyes." 

 But in this bird usefulness ex- 

 ists as a corollary of beauty. 

 When the young chicks are 

 reared under a bantam hen, 

 they invariably keep close be- 

 hind their foster-mother, for 

 no apparent reason; indeed this position often results in 

 their death, a kick from the bird's foot generally being 

 fatal. The reason for this strange instinctive act is at 

 once clear when we see the chicks with their rightful 

 mother. They spend much of their time hidden beneath 

 the shelter of her long, sloping tail, coming out now 



Fig. 335.— Useful tail of Peacock 

 Pheasant. 



