182 AFFINITIES AND GEOGRAPHICAL 



coreopsis of Australia. The rise of wading descendants 

 was the consequence of a spread inland ; that is, harmoniz- 

 ing with that system of animal migration which the swim- 

 ming birds are still seen practising. This movement of 

 bird life soon overpassed the borders of rivers, lakes, and 

 marshes, and came to elevated, dry, and sylvan grounds; 

 and a necessity for other modifications then arose. 



At least two of the subdivisions under notice had descend- 

 ants suited to the new fields of existence. The cranes, spread 

 as far south as India, there gave forth, as a great colony for 

 its rich woods, the equally beautiful and useful Pheasant 

 family (Phasianidce), comprising the trained peacock, the 

 jungle-fowl, and common poultry ; in central America, in 

 like manner, they presented the corresponding genera of 

 turkeys and currassows. Thus came those useful domestic 

 birds, some of which have been our servants as long as man 

 has had a history, and which have entered so much into our 

 common associations and literature. From them, again, pro- 

 ceeded the Pigeons (Colwmbidce) whose beauty and inno- 

 cence are even more endearingly present to us. To those 

 who see but the common fowl and the ordinary pigeon of our 

 country, it may be difficult to suppose such a connexion ; but 

 in India, the native seat of the family, the forms of the dove 

 are numerous, and amongst them are species (for example, 

 Geophilus Nicobarensis) which are evidently intermediate. 



The game birds, grouse, partridges, quails, &c. (Tetrao- 

 nidae} are descendants of the rails and bustards, appropriate 

 to the heathy moorland and mountain. So ends the first 

 great stirps of the class of Birds. 



Some general principles are clearly to be observed in the 

 genealogy. Each subdivision preserves its own character, 

 particularly as to food, through all the transformations which 

 it undergoes. Thus the anserine birds, the cranes, and the 

 poultry and pigeons, are all of them innocent vegetable-feed- 

 ing animals. There is also an invariable diminution of size 

 of body from the oceanic original to the inland descendants : 

 for example, the anserine birds sink in the cranes, these fall 



