BIRDS OF THE ROCKS. 177 



upon my shoes, and hear the runic notes that 

 have ripened into the song of the mocking- 

 bird and the brown-thrush. 



Below the surface of Professor Huxley's 

 comparisons of the Birds and the Reptiles 

 there is a strong current of most fascinating 

 poetry flowing back over the fossil-bearing 

 rocks. I take it that the first men were much 

 nearer to Nature than we are. It may be that 

 an hereditary far-fetched memory (so to speak) 

 of winged monsters, suggested the dragons 

 and griffins of early song. The crude but per- 

 fectly natural imaginings of the savages of to- 

 day, as well as the refined fantasies of the an- 

 cients, seem to smack of "this lingering hered- 

 itament transmitted through a thousand 

 changes from the lower estate. Pan, the goat- 

 footed musician, is scarcely less monstrous, 

 when we view him soberly, than many of the 

 beings shut up in the stones. 



Mr. Seeley has described a most interesting 

 bird of the eocene period, named Odontopteryx 

 toliapicus, probably a fish-eater, having nearly 

 the habits of a cormorant, whose mouth was 

 rimmed with bony teeth set in the powerful 

 jaws. An expression of savage fierceness and 

 voracity has clung to this bird's head-bones 

 through countless ages of change. Not even 

 the relentless grip of the rocks for a million 

 of years could entirely quench the demoniac 

 spirit of the creature. In what sea or lake or 

 stream did it strike its prey ? On what windy 

 ocean crag did it rear its clamorous brood ? 

 I should like to have a look at its nest, if only 

 to compare it with those of the fish-eaters of 

 to-day, but much better should I enjoy a sail on 

 the waters it haunted, with the wind on my 



