BIRDS OF PARADISE. 



4*3 



tained, probably it is beneath the leaves of the palm 

 Vunilv, some of which are so large that a single one 

 suffices for a tent ; and they are more tough and firm 

 than many kinds of our ordinary timber. Palm trees 

 are altogether admirably fitted for resisting the violence 

 of the tropical storms, and for affording hold and 

 shelter to any creatures that can cling to the thick 

 tufts of leaves with which their tough but flexible 

 stems are crowned. A palm trunk is, indeed, a 

 realisation of the fable of " the bundle of rods." The 

 longitudinal fibres, which extend from the root of the 

 tree to its crown without any interruption from 

 branches, or even any iiexure, are so hard, firm, 

 and elastic, that they have almost as much resem- 

 blance to wires of elastic metal as to the limber of any 

 tree of temperate climates ; and while they all have 

 equal tension, they are embedded in a cellular tissue, 

 which keeps them from pressing upon each other ; 

 and so renders the fracture of a very tall and slender 

 stem, and therefore one which, according to our 

 ordinary notions seems very feeble, next to impossible. 

 The palm family are so numerous, and form so general 

 and characteristic a feature in the scenery of tropical 

 countries, that the knowledge of them is necessary to 

 the proper understanding of tropical forest animals, 

 whether mammalia or birds. But though closely con- 

 nected with the history of birds of paradise, an account 

 of those highly interesting trees would be out of place 

 here. See the article PALMS. 



Notwithstanding that the old fable of the birds of 

 paradise being footless, inhabiting the air only, feedin L 

 upon nectar and dew and even odours, and never 

 coming to the ground, or resting upon any other sup- 

 port than the air until exhausted, incapable of the 

 mysterious wingless flight, and at the point of death, 

 has been exploded, there still hangs a good deal oi 

 mystery about their mode of flying; and they do fall, 

 both on the eanh and in the narrow seas across which 

 their periodical migrations are taken, more frequently 

 than a:iy ordinary air-birds. They fly, as has has been 

 stated, only with their heads to the wind, and as the 

 produced feathers of the flanks entirely cover the 

 closed wing when the bird is in a state of repose, the 

 same feathers would keep down and entangle both 

 wings if the bird were taken by the wind in the rear 

 and even when it attempts to come obliquely, or fly 

 upon a wind as one would say, the windward wing 

 gets entangled in these feathers and down the bin 

 drops. If it falls in the water, it of course speedily 

 perishes ; and when it falls on the land, though its 

 produced and flocculent feathers prevent it fron 

 receiving any injury, yet it has considerable difficult) 

 in righting itself, and it cannot take the air again with- 

 out getting upon a stone, a clod, or some other littl 

 eminence. In consequence of this it becomes an eas\ 

 prey to the natives, in the same manner as the parro 

 tribe are easily taken when they miss their hold an 

 tumble from their perches. 



So far as is known, birds of paradise are the onl) 

 species which are subject to lose their poise and com 

 mand of themselves in the free air. and tumble dowr 

 without any injury or exhaustion ; and it is possible 

 and even likely, that this habit, which must hav 

 struck the first observers of them very forcibly, gav< 

 rise to that part of the fabulous account which repre 

 sents them as tumbling to the earth in order to di 

 there, but keeping the air at all other times. Here i 

 may be proper to remark, that it behoves us to paus 

 before we altogether discard as fabulous any of thos 



ccounts of natural productions, however ridiculous 

 ley may appear, and however they may involve 

 ontradictiotis or impossibilities, which have been 

 nade by persons actually visiting the places alluded 

 o. Those fables are seldom if ever substantially 

 [iventions of the original narrators. In nine cases 

 ut of every ten it will be found that how much soever 

 Key may have blundered in the representation of it, 

 liere was a real foundation for the story; and thus 

 he fable has its use as the means of guiding us to the 

 eality; and the business of true science consists in 

 etting these matters to rights, while that which would 

 explode them altogether is the mere arrogance of 

 gnorance. We have proofs of this in many instances; 

 and among others in the giraffe and the unicorn; 

 hough the former animal is now well known ; and 

 lot a doubt remains that the animal which has so long 

 lourished in heraldic and other fanciful story, is the 

 oryx or straight-horned antelope of Central Africa, of 

 which there are profile representations in the ancient 

 nomiments of Upper Nubia and Abyssinia, which 

 are intermediate in their form between this antelope 

 and our fabled unicorn. 



In like manner the perpetual dwelling in the air 

 attributed to the birds of paradise was the way which 

 the folks of the olden time had of expressing a style 

 of flight, and the use of feathers, which they did not 

 very well understand. It is worthy of remark too that 

 it is not the early visiters of the distant climes where 

 these birds are found to which the fabulous accounts of 

 them are owing, so much as to the hasty conclusions 

 formed by the learned at home, from the imperfect 

 data which the narratives of those travellers afforded. 

 Pigafetta was scolded by Aldrovand, and even by 

 Scaliger, as a most audacious heretic in science for 

 daring to say that the birds of paradise had feet, 

 although he had actually seen them using these organs 

 in perching; and as, in the earlier stages of discovery 

 especially, we did not get the information direct from 

 the original observer, but through the medium of some 

 learned redacteur, or the combined speculation of 

 some learned body, and therefore the truth of the 

 narrative was trimmed to the fashionable theory of 

 the day, be that what it might. One of the greatest 

 improvements which has resulted from the general 

 diffusion of knowledge as preparatory for observing 

 and recording observations, is the perfect fidelity with 

 which all that is new in nature is now rendered to the 

 world by travellers of almost every class in their own 

 words, unencumbered by anybody's speculation ; and 

 the advances which have in consequence been made, 

 more especially in zoological science, are unprece- 

 dented in the whole annals of human knowledge. 



That birds of paradise are incapable of taking 

 flight in any way but against the wind is proved by 

 their migrations, as well as apparent from their fea- 

 thers, and the general form of the anterior part of 

 their bodies. They shift with the monsoons, to \\hich 

 the turn of the seasons in those seas is chiefly owing. 

 The principal range of the birds is nearly under the 

 equator, though more on the south of it than the 

 north, and while it does not, so far as has been dis- 

 covered, any where exceed 10 in latitude, or about 

 700 miles, and is generally much less, it ranges 25 

 in longitude, or 1750 miles, that is from about 125 

 to about 150 east longitude. 



This space, though (with ihe exception of New 

 Guinea, the geography of which is imperfectly known) 

 it consists onlv of small islands, which if they are 

 P P2 



