^ HISTORY OF 



rud«^r and more imperfect ; and they are in general found inca- 

 jiable of the docility even of quadrupeds. Indeed, what de- 

 gree of sagacity can be expected in animals whose eyes are al- 

 most as large as their brain ? However, though they fall below 

 quadrupeds in the scale of nature, and are less imitative of hu- 

 man endowments ; yet they hold the next rank, and far surpass 

 ?.shes and insects, both in the structure of their bodies and in 

 their sagacity. 



As in mechanics the most curious instruments are generally 

 the most complicated, so it is in anatomy. The body of man 

 presents the greatest variety upon dissection ; quadrupeds, less 

 perfectly formed, discover their defects in the simplicity of their 

 conformation; the mechanism of birds is still less complex; 

 fishes are furnished with fewer organs still ; whilst insects, more 

 imperfect than all, seem to fill up the chasm that separates ani- 

 mal from vegetable nature. Of man, the most perfect animal, 

 there are but three or four species ; of quadrupeds, the kinds are 

 more numerous ; birds are more various still ; fishes yet more ; 

 but insects afford so very great a variety, that they elude the 

 search of the most inquisitive pursuer. 



Quadrupeds, as was said, have some distant resemblance in 

 their internal structure with man ; but that of birds is entirely 

 dissimilar. As they seem chiefly formed to inhabit the empty 

 regions of air, all their parts are adapted to their destined situa- 

 tion. It will be proper, therefore, before I give a general his- 

 tory of birds, to enter into a slight detail of their anatomy and 

 conformation. 



As to their external parts, they seem surprisingly adapted for 

 swiftness of motion. The shape of their body is sharp before, 

 to pierce and make way through the air ; it then rises by a gen- 

 tle swelling to its bulk, and falls off in an expansive tail, that 

 helps to keep it bouyant, while the fore-parts are cleaving the 

 air by their sharpness. From this conformation, they have often 

 been compared to a ship making its way through water ; the 

 trunk of the body answers to the hold, the head to the prow, the 

 jtail to the rudder, and the wings to the oars ; from whence the 

 poets have adopted the metaphor of remigium alarum, when 

 they described the wavy motion of a bird in flight. 



AVhat we are called upon next to admire in the external for- 

 mation of birds is the neat position of the feathers, lying all one 



