NATURAL HISTORf. 227 



" The hosts of birds, that win.? the liquid air 



Perch'd in the boughs, had nightly lodgings there." DRYDEW. 



bird devours the serpent. This is the manner in which large and 

 venomous serpents are killed ; but the bird frequently swallows 

 non-venomous snakes alive. 



683. The secretary bird destroys serpents, rats, and vermin, and is on that account 

 much esteemed in the southern parts of Africa, which abounds with venomous 

 serpents, snakes, scorpions, and noxious reptiles, also with lizards of many 

 descriptions ; the land-tortoise, grylloe, or locusts, in variety, abundance, and 

 depredation equalling their destructive hosts in other countries. Barrow relates a 

 very curious circumstance respecting living serpents in the stomach of one of thest 

 birds after death. An English gentleman, who held an official situation at the Cape, 

 being out on a shooting party, killed a secretary bird, which he carried home with 

 the intention of having an accurate drawing made from it. He threw it on the floor 

 of the balcony near the house, when, after it had remained some time, and been 

 examined and tossed about, one of the company observed a large snake pushing 

 open the beak, out of which he speedily crawled in perfect vigour, and free from 

 any injury. On the supposition that others might be in the stomach, the bird was 

 suspended by the legs, and presently a second made its appearence, as large and 

 as lively as the first. The bird was afterwards open, when the stomach was found 

 to contain seven dead snakes, with a half-digested mass of lizards, scorpions, 

 scolopendne, centipedes, and beetles. 



ORDER II.-INCESSORES. 



684. Why are the incessores so named f 



From their classification as perching birds : the word incessores 

 being derived from insideo, to lie in ambush ; indicating that 

 the proper habitat of the order, with its sub-orders, is a bush 

 or tree. 



685. They are also called passcres or passerine birds, from passer, "a sparrow," 

 to which bird the greater number of incessores bear a strong resemblance. 

 In all the true incessorial birds, the toes are three before and one behind. 

 The adaptation of the foot to grasping or perching is evident from the situation 

 of the hinder toe, which is invariably placed on the same level with those in 

 front, and by which they are distinguished from the rasores (scrapers) and 

 \llatores (waders). The toes are slender, flexible, and of moderate length; 

 the foot oi the canary affords a very good example. The incessore 

 on the wing ; thir legs are therefore much less developed than tbose 



