172 HABITS OF BIRDS. 



stretches out its feeble legs, which are yet insufficient 

 to carry it. Being- then entirely or almost out of 

 the shell, it draws its head from under the wing 

 where it had hitherto been thrust, stretches out its 

 neck, and directs it forward, but is not strong enough 

 for several minutes to raise it. Upon seeing for the 

 first time a chick in this condition we are led to 

 infer that its strength is exhausted, and that it is 

 ready to expire ; but in most cases it recruits rapidly, 

 all its organs gather strength, and in a very short 

 time it appears quite another creature. After having 

 dragged itself on its legs for a little while, it becomes 

 able to stand on them, to lift up its neck, to bend it 

 in various directions, and finally, to hold up its head. 

 The feathers are at this period only fine down ; and 

 as they are wet with the fluid matter of the egg, the 

 chick appears almost naked. By the multitude of 

 their branches these down feathers look like so many 

 minute shrubs ; yet when those branches are wet and 

 sticking to each other, they take up very little room, 

 but as they dry they become disentangled and sepa- 

 rated. The branchlets, plumules, or beards of each 

 feather are at first enclosed in a membranous tube, 

 by which they are pressed and kept close together ; 

 but as soon as this dries it splits asunder, an effect 

 which is also aided by the elastic springs of the 

 beards themselves causing them to recede and 

 spread about. When this is accomplished, each 

 feather extends over a considerable space, and when 

 they all become dry and straight, the chick appears 

 completely clothed in a warm vestment of soft 

 down*." 



It would not be according to the usual course of 

 nature unless the greater number of eggs sat upon 

 proved fertile ; but circumstances, many of them un- 

 intelligible to us, occur during hatching, which render 

 * Oiseaux Domestiques, as before. 



