Feet and Legs 067 



the race as a whole the\- are forgotten, but it is well for 

 us to think of them occasionally: their l:)irth, the chance 

 which came, which seemed so full of promise, whicli they 

 so eagerly accepted and which betrayed them; the myriad 

 little dead forms which gave up their li\es in ages past, 

 and upon whose bodies and whose efforts the birds of 

 to-day have risen to their present high place in the scale 

 of the creatures of the world. 



We might have used this same illustration, or many 

 others like it, in connection with almost any other jiortion 

 of the bird's body. Although, indeed, it j^ertains more 

 strictly to the mental characters, and so is in a way out- 

 side the province of this volume, yet its application to 

 physical adaptations is so evident that its omission would 

 leave incomplete a most interesting })hase of the possi- 

 bilities of the adaptation of l)ird structure. 



Although among perching birds the bill is the important 

 organ for procuring food, yet such birds as the C'hewink, 

 the White-throated Sparrow, and the jays, in search of 

 small insects use their feet to scratch away dead leaves 

 and rubl)ish, kicking l^ackward with l)oth feet at once. 



There are many ciu'ious things about toes to which 

 we have not yet found the key. Who can tell why the 

 Horned Lark, Pi])it, and some other l)irds have such 

 elongated claws on their rear toes? Perha])s the fact 

 that these l)irds live almost entirely on the gi'ound may 

 have something to do with this ]ieculiarity. Any one who 

 has kept a cage full of small birds will soon have learned 

 the fact that the claws of ]:)irds are continually growing. 

 In a remarkably short time their claws become long and 



