UTILITY OF BIRDS. 61 



peckers are never seen foraging in flocks. The more tliey 

 scatter themselves, the better is their fare. All birds that 

 assemble in dense flocks, except the aquatic tribes, are either 

 entirely granivorous, like pigeons, or partially so, like black- 

 birds. Woodpeckers are indefatigable devourers of emmets, 

 taking them not only from the surface, but also drawing them 

 and their larva out of the crevices of timber. It is hardly 

 possible to overestimate the services performed by this tribe of 

 birds, in their ceaseless operations among the trees. 



Thus far I have treated only of birds that take tlieir food 

 chiefly from the foliage, flowers, and branches of trees and 

 shrubs — the natural guardians of the forest and orchard. But 

 there are many tribes that seldom take any thing from trees, 

 and confine tlieir foraging almost entirely to the surface 

 of the ground. Such are the pigeons, all the gallinaceous 

 birds, larks, blackbirds, snipes and thrushes. These are the 

 guardians of the soil ; and may also be made to assume an 

 arrangement analogous to the circles above described. For 

 example, the snipe, the woodcock, the plover, and their 

 allied species, feed chiefly upon worms and insects that live 

 underneath the surface, digging under it for their prey with 

 their long bills. They occupy a position analogous to that 

 of the woodpeckers. Larks, quails, thrushes and blackbirds 

 gather the principal part of their food from the surface, 

 seizing only upon those underneath it, which are partly 

 exposed to sight. 



The thrushes forage mostly upon the surface of the ground. 

 Though they do not refuse an insect or a grub discovered upon 

 a leaf or a branch of a tree, they hunt their food upon the bare 

 soil or the green sward. One circumstance that attracts fre- 

 quent attention in the feeding habits of the thrushes, is their 

 apparent want of diligence ; but this appearance is delusive, 

 for the immense quantity of insects consumed by them could 

 not be obtained without proportional industry. The common 

 robin will exemplify the general habit of the thrushes, 

 though he carries their peculiarities to an extreme. When he 

 hunts his food, he is usually seen hopping listlessly about the 

 field. Sometimes a dozen robins, or more, may be seen in one 

 field, but they are always widely separated. Observe one of 

 them, and you will see him standing still with his bill inclined 



