CHAPTER VIII. 



WINGS AND STERNAL APPARATUS OF BIRDS, AS 

 ILLUSTRATIVE OF THEIR HABITS, MORE ESPECIALLY 

 THEIR POWER AND STYLE OF FLIGHT. 



As wings are the grand characteristic of birds, which 

 especially distinguishes them from all other vertebrated 

 animals, one might naturally suppose that in these 

 organs would be found not only the best means of 

 subdividing them into orders, groups, and genera, 

 but also the best indications of the habits of even par- 

 ticular species. De Blainville was, we believe, the 

 first to suggest such an arrangement ; and an outline 

 was subsequently given by Dr. Lherminier, in the 

 Transactions of the Linnsean Society of Paris, and 

 afterwards in a separate pamphlet, in the year 1828. 

 There is a great deal of merit in M. Lherminier's 

 little work, the size and science of which are well 

 worthy the attention of all writers upon similar sub- 

 jects. But still, though a system could unquestion- 

 ably be founded upon the wings of birds, or even, as 

 the Doctor's is, founded upon the sternal apparatus in 

 the skeleton, as giving insertion and stability to those 

 muscles which perform the grand motions of the wing ; 

 yet that, after all, would be a system of flying, and 

 not a system of birds, because all birds must eat ; and 

 there are no birds so absolutely destitute of feet as 

 some birds are of wings. Notwithstanding, the 

 wings, and especially this part of them, and not 



