B I R D, 



41,1 



realh' no such correspondence, they either waste their 

 time in vain search alter that which is not. to be 

 found, or they turn troin [lie system (mid, in part, 

 from the subject) with disappointment, as promising 

 that which it cannot perform. 



The feet of poultry and of pigeons are both adapted 

 for walking on the ground, and tho>e of some species 

 of both are adapted for perching : their bills, too, are 

 both adapted for ground feeding, though not exactly 

 for the same kind of surfaces or of substances; but 

 when thus much has been stated, the parallel is nearly 

 at an end. Thus far may be seen at first sight, of 

 the two ; and when we come to study them more inti- 

 mately, there is nothing, even of inference and ana- 

 logy, iu the general history of the one, that can lead 

 us to the general history of the other. 



The different casualties of the pheasant preserve 

 and the pigeon-house show that, physiologically con- 

 sidered, the two races have little in common ; that 

 independently of difference of power and style of 

 flight, feeding, incubation, nesting and breeding, tex- 

 ture and flavour of flesh, and all other particulars 

 there is a difference in the whole nature of the birds, 

 as they stand related to the course of natural events. 

 The pigeons have, as has been stated, only a lodging 

 in the pigeon-house, while the pheasants have both 

 cover and food in their preserve that is, not merely 

 shelter while they are at rest, and accommodation for 

 their nests, but food, and protection from the weather 

 while they are gathering it. But under all the appa- 

 rent differences of accommodation, the pigeons thrive 

 best. As their numbers increase they extend the 

 range of their feeding excursions ; and though on 

 these they have to use the wing much, and often to 

 contend with the severity of the weather, they do not 

 appear subject to any casualty of nature, but to 

 thrive as well and be as healthy when they range 

 over many miles as when they are kept at home and 

 fed by the hand. The pheasants, on the other hand, 

 cannot endure even their natural powers to increase 

 beyond a certain limit ; for (as was not many years 

 ago proved at Wanstead, in Essex) if they are 

 allowed, even in the most favourable preserve, to in- 

 crease beyond a certain limit, e/>izooh/ falls on them, 

 and they die by the score, not of hunger or any other 

 perceptible cause, for they die in good condition, and 

 the mortality continues till their numbers are reduced 

 considerably below what would be left by a judicious 

 sportsman. 



Our native gullinidie have not, perhaps, been so 

 carefully studied ; but there are well authenticated 

 instances in which excessive preservation has been 

 followed by, if it has not actually produced, epizooty, 

 both in the mountaineers and the inhabitants of the 

 plains. If such were the case only with pheasants, 

 their foreign origin, and the many mild climates of 

 which they are natives, might be alleged as the cause ; 

 but as the ptarmigan is the highest dweller of all our 

 native birds, and the grouse live in more bleak places 

 than the pigeon, and as they are subject to the 

 casualty from which pigeons are exempted, we must 

 conclude that the whole of the gallinaceous tribes, of 

 which these are the most hardy, are physiologically 

 different from the pigeons, and tempered to the ele- 

 ments in a very different degree. Taken alone, this 

 would be a good argument against uniting the two in 

 the same order ; but when taken along with the 

 structural, and even the textnral differences of the 

 birds, and the differences of all their actions and 



habits, it becomes irresistibly conclusive ; and galli- 

 iiidtK and columbada; should unquestionably form 

 separate orders in any system pretending to be 

 natural. 



If this is done, each of the orders becomes well- 

 defined as well as natural ; and they do not even clash 

 or get confounded with each other on their confine-, 

 as is the case with many of the other orders. The 

 structure, the action, the habits, and the general cha- 

 racter, as inferred from the whole, are all so constant 

 in each, and so different in the two, that if we know 

 one genus well, we never can be at a loss wi*h any 

 other in the order ; neither can we, in any instance, 

 confound the two. 



The fluttering and apparently painful flight of the 

 gallinaceous birds may excuse a few sentences of 

 explanation, as it is one of their most general and 

 most striking differences from most other winged 

 birds, and as the explanatory notice of it will throw 

 some further light upon the structure of the organs of 

 flight. This becomes the more justifiable, because 

 the more necessary and useful, when we consider that 

 the superiority of the flesh of the gallinidde to that <f 

 all other birds, as human food, if not dependent upon, 

 is at least intimately connected with their imperfect 

 power of flight. 



When we speak of the flesh of any animal as an 

 article of food, it is always the muscular part of the 

 animal which is chiefly understood. We cannot 

 exactly estimate the power of muscles upon common 

 mechanical principles, because the energy of life in 

 the animal to which they belong is always an element, 

 and one which we can subject to no calculation. 

 But the quantity and texture of the muscle are also 

 elements ; and though we cannot say that the power 

 of action varies exactly as any one of them, or as 

 both jointly, yet it does increase with their increase 

 and diminish with their diminution. Now, air birds, 

 whose action is chiefly performed by the wing, have 

 almost the whole muscular structure of their bodies 

 concentrated upon that ; and if they have to remain 

 long in the air, and contend with the wind there, the 

 structure of the muscles is proportionally rigid, and 

 they are, of course, difficult of mastication and diges- 

 tion. In these cases, extra dressing, whether by the 

 action of the dry fire or by boiling, does not cure the 

 evil; for though these muscles become more easily 

 divided in proportion as they are more dressed, thev 

 become at the same time, and perhaps in a greater 

 proportion, more dry and tasteless, and less digestive 

 and nourishing. A dinner of the pectoral muscles of 

 well-seasoned eagles, or the larger hawks, would be 

 serious labour for the jaws of even the most willing 

 masticator; and bating the bitter taste, a rook of iiv< 

 broods would make almost as tough a meal as oakum 

 or old junk. These qualities decrease as the birds 

 make less use of their wings ; and in those birds 

 which are not allowed to fly at all, while fattening 

 for the table, the muscle is more juicy and tender 

 than in any others. But that preparation may be 

 overdone, by the bird having less exercise than 

 accords with a healthy state of its system, and then 

 what is gained in tenderness and even mass of flesh, 

 is more than lost in flavour and wholesomeness. If 

 the inactivity is unnatural and the food abundant, 

 the tendency is an over-production of fat ; and the 

 fat of birds is the least wholesome of all fat. It con- 

 sists chiefly of elain, and not of crystallisable fat, 

 and as such it very readily passes into an oil, difficult 



