Birds by Land and Sea 



recognizable, and are seen to be provided with nails. 

 The hoatzin, a bird of British Guiana, is often 

 referred to as an illustration of the changes which 

 have come about in the form and function of a bird's 

 fore-limb ; but inspection of the picture of the 

 "Young Yellow-Hammer clasping Egg" will re- 

 veal the unfledged thumb and nail of this common 

 British bird laid across the egg lying at the bottom 

 of the nest. Upon moving the young bird, I 

 was struck by the way in which it made use of 

 its " thumb " to work itself back into its former 

 position, and to clasp the egg as it readjusted itself 

 about it in the nest. 



Passing through a neighbouring village on the 

 evening of the i8th of August, I was attracted by a 

 sound resembling to some extent the wiry wheeze of 

 a starling, which came from the belfry of the parish 

 church. Upon my approaching, however, it was 

 evidently too strong for a starling, and seemed more 

 like a continuous light snore, in which the apparently 

 inward and outward breathings were clearly marked. 

 Hearing passers comment on the unearthly noise, one 

 could readily understand how the barn, screech, or 

 church owl had from of old come to be regarded as 

 a bird of ill omen, associated in the popular 

 imagination with ideas of death and calamity. Its 

 ghostly snore, heard in the stillness and darkness 

 of the churchyard, was well calculated to set the 

 imagination to work with gruesome ideas supplied 

 by the immediate surroundings ; and when the bird 



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