BIRD. 



haps one of the most picturesque scenes, on a 

 small scale, which the country affords. 



It is difficult to say in which places of the Scottish 

 Highlands, cascades and rapids, with their accom- 

 paniment of waving birches, are the finest ; but the 

 " Dream of Kilmorac" on the Beauly, the fall of 

 R;":gart on the Conan, some of the woods at Cawdor 

 Castle, those by Inver Farigag, and other places by 

 Loch Ness, and also many parts on the Dulnan, are 

 worth visiting. 



Among the rude Highlanders the birch is the prin- 

 cipal tree for country purposes : fences, houses, carts, 

 ploughs, and all sorts of implements are made of 

 birch ; and it used to be quite common to see at the 

 fairs in Inverness scores of equipages fully equipped, 

 in which the horses and their riders were the only por- 

 tions not made of birch. The twigs of the tree are 

 naturally very tough ; but, when used as substitutes 

 for cordage, or for leather in harness, they have great 

 additional toughness given to them by peeling off 

 the bark and twisting the wood till it separates into 

 fibres. A birchen " wilhie," as it is called, thus 

 made, is considerably stronger and far more durable 

 than a hempen cord of the same diameter ; and the 

 people use these, not as substitutes for cordage and 

 leather, but as substitutes for iron. The wheels of 

 the old-fashioned carts which were used for country 

 purposes, were small discs of wood, made fast to the 

 ends of a wooden roller, attached to the under part 

 of the frame by two loops of birchen withie, turned 

 round in them, which was the means of rotatory 

 motion in the wheels : the creaking was exceedingly 

 disagreeable, and so loud as to be heard several 

 miles off. 



The timber of the birch is white, close, and easily 

 worked, so that it answers well in articles of turnery ; 

 but it is generally only of small diameter, and when 

 used flat, it is very apt to warp. It is also very 

 perishable when exposed to alternations of weather in 

 close air, though it stands well in fences and hurdles ; 

 it is also much used for hoops, and the smaller twigs 

 for brooms, the demand for which is very con- 

 siderable. In the early part of the season, when the 

 sap is in the wood, a sweetish juice may be obtained 

 by bleeding the trunk, and this juice, which has an 

 agreeable taste, is sometimes made into a weak wine. 

 The native birch is very easily raised in the nur- 

 sery, and is so hardy, that it will grow in almost any 

 soil, though the richer parts of the moorlands are 

 the best adapted for it. 



There are many foreign species, the timber of some 

 of which is highly coloured, and therefore more 

 showy than that of the native tree. But these specie! 

 are generally American ; and American trees never 

 yield so solid or so durable timber as European ones 

 of the same genera. Some of their foliages have a 

 deep colour, and therefore make a good variety in 

 ornamental planting ; and as the autumnal tints oi 

 American trees are remarkable both for their variety 

 and their beauty, they are still more ornamental on 

 these account?. As timber trees, however, it is doubt- 

 ful whether they are worthy of cultivation. 



The bark of the birch tree is an article of domestic 

 economy, both in the countries north of the Baltic 

 inn] in America, where it attains a larger size than 

 naturally in Britain. The bark is firm and durable 

 and it is made into boxes, cups, and various other 

 containing vessels, by sewing it together. It is also 

 the principal material of which the light canoes of the 



Morth American Indians and Canadian hunters arc 

 made ; and those canoes arc not only much lighter than 

 our best constructed boats of the same burthen, but 

 hey are much stronger and scarcely less handsome. 



BIRD (Avis, literally " that which flies," or in 

 the plural avcs, birds). A class of warm-blooded 

 animals, and the second into which the vertebrated 

 animals are arranged by most of the systematic natu- 

 ralists. 



Birds are a well-marked and easily distinguished 

 lass, even by their external characters ; so that, 

 though they differ much from each other in their 

 appearances and habits, there is not the least dan- 

 ger of confounding them with any of the other classes. 

 They are all produced from eggs, which are very 

 generally, but not universally, hatched by the heat of 

 the parent, which incubates, or siis upon them, warm- 



; them with the heat of the breast, which appears 

 to increase for the purpose, and be one. of the natural 

 inducements for the bird to sit ; and in many cases 

 the breast of the female becomes denuded of great 

 part of its usual covering, by which means the heat 

 is more freely and immediately communicated to 

 the eggs, the natural covering being a bad conductor 

 of heat. 



Though birds are not the only animals which are 

 produced from eggs, and though the eggs of some 

 species of reptiles resemble those of some birds both 

 in size and in colour, yet the egg of a bird is very 

 easily distinguished from that of any other animal. 

 The shell is harder, containing more salts of lime and 

 less gelatinous matter than that of the eggs of rep- 

 tiles, and it is more granular in its surface ; it is 

 also more brittle, though from its shape it is strong 

 in proportion to the quantity of matter in it. Far- 

 ther, the egg of a bird cannot be dinted without a 

 fracture of the shell, while that of almost every 

 other oviparous animal may. The contents of the 

 bird's egg are also chemically different from those 

 of that of the reptile ; indicating even in the rudi- 

 mental state a higher degree of organisation, and 

 along with it, as is always the case, greater energy 

 and activity in the powers of life. The egg of the 

 bird is much more albuminous, so that, it " boils 

 hard," while that of the reptile consists more of gela- 

 tine. The flesh of the animals has much the same 

 difference of quality. The muscular parts of birds 

 are more dry and rigid than those of even the mam- 

 malia ; and some of them are so hard and tough, as 

 not to be eatable. The tendons and even the mem- 

 branes have the same proportional firmness of struc- 

 ture ; so that the flesh of an eagle is much firmer 

 than the flesh of a lion. Even the bones of birds 

 partake of that firmness which is traceable in the 

 egg. All those which are elongated and cylindrical 

 are hollow ; but there is no marrow in the tubes, 

 and no part of them is cellular with merely a crust 

 of solid bone on the outside, as is the case in many 

 of the bones of the mammalia. They are all remark- 

 ably firm in their texture, and the shape of the bone 

 is always such as to give the greatest possible degree 

 both of strength and of stiffness with the least pos- 

 sible quantity of materials. 



The distinctive characters which are traceable in 

 the covering and contents of the egg, are found in 

 an especially conspicuous manner in the covering of 

 the bird. All birds are covered with feathers ; and 

 they are the only animals which, properly speaking, 

 are so. These feathers are of two sorts, feathers 



