298 THE HARMONIES OF NATURE, 



head reversed. In this position the weight and size of the 

 tongue become a very efficient instrument for entrapping the 

 food. The bird waddles and clatters the bill, and dabbles about, 

 and the tongue receives and holds as a strainer whatever the 

 water offers of food. 



In many of the insectivorous birds the tongue is equally well 

 adapted for seizing its nimble prey before it has time to secrete 

 itself in some impenetrable citadel. Thus after the strong 

 beak of the woodpecker has dislodged the insects from their 

 hiding-places, they are immediately transfixed with the hard, 



horny, and sharp point of 

 its tongue (a), which it is 

 capable of darting forth 

 with amazing rapidity, and 

 held fast by the sharp - 

 pointed processes directed 

 backwards, which arm its 



Cranium and Tongue of a Woodpecker. 



sides and thus convert it 



into a barbed harpoon. In the hummingbirds it is divided at 

 its extremity into a pencil of fine hairs, well-fitted for imbibing 

 the nectar and farina of flowers; while in the toucan, stiff 



Tongue cf the Toucan. 



bristle-like processes project forwards from its sides, and the 

 tongue so provided becomes an instrument for testing the soft- 

 ness and ripeness of fruit, and the fitness of other objects for 

 food, thereby acting as a kind of antenna or feeler. 



In the parrots it is thick and fleshy, serving admirably to keep 

 steady the nut or seed upon which the strength of the mandibles 

 is exerted, and is applied to the kernel so extracted, as if to 

 ascertain its sapid qualities. 



The birds are unable to chew or masticate, but this defect is 

 amply supplied by the peculiar construction of their digestive 

 apparatus, which in every case is admirably modified, according 

 to the nature or volume of the food. Thus in those species 

 which devour but small quantities at a time, and without any 

 considerable intermission, or where the aliments are of easy 



