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the comparison of all the modifications of any one organ in all the 
plants or animals in which that organ exists ; and this comparison 
will furnish foo1 for reflection and increase in knowledge for the 
rest of one’s life. One of the attractions of Botany is the immense 
variety of structure and form that one organ exhibits in different 
plants. Take for instance the corolla, What an interesting series 
of shapes and modifications it shows even in familiar plants, such 
as the poppy, the buttercup, the foxglove, the dead nettle, and the 
dandelion. Even small parts like the anthers show a wonderful 
variety in their shape, their attachment to the filament of the 
stamen, and to one another, their mode of opening, and the 
direction in which they open, as again in the buttercup, the rose, 
the violet, and the dandelion. In some cases we think we can 
Tunderstand the reasons for these differences; in others, as yet, 
we cannot, but the interest we can find in such matters is almost 
endless. At this Society we once had a very interesting paper on 
Tails. Iam to-night going to investigate the other extremity, and 
give: a little attention to the beaks or bills of birds. I have on 
previous occasions drawn your attention more especially to the 
general anatomy of birds, and also to the structure, macroscopic and 
microscopic, of their feathers. Now, before saying anything my- 
self about this interesting and variable part of a bird, I will read 
what Ruskin has to say on the subject in general in ‘ Love’s 
Meinie :”—“‘ I do not think itis distinctly enough felt by us that the 
beak of a bird is not only its mouth, but its hand, or, rather, igs 
two hands. For, as its arms and hands are turned into wings, all 
it has to depend upon, in economical and practical life, is its beak. 
The beak, therefore, is at once its sword, its carpenter’s tool box, 
and its dressing case, partly also its musical instrument—all this 
besides its functions of seizing and preparing the food, in which 
functions alone it has to be a trap, carving knife and teeth, all in 
one. It is this need of the beak’s being a mechanical tool which 
chiefly regulates the form of a bird’s face, as opposed to a four- 
footed animal’s. If the question of food were the only one, we 
might wonder why there were not more four-footed creatures living 
on seeds than there are, or why those that do—field mice and the 
like—have not beaks instead of teeth. But the fact is that a bird’s 
beak is by no means a perfect eating or food seizing instrument. 
A squirrel is far more dexterous with a nut than a cockatoo, and a 
dog manages a bone incomparably better than an eagle. But the 
beak has to do so much more. Pruning feathers, building nests, 
and the incessant discipline in military arts, are all to be thought 
of as much as feeding. ’ 
Soldiership especially is a much more imperious necessity among 
birds than quadrupeds; neither lions nor wolves habitually use 
