52 PHEASANTS 



or so that divide this point in the pro- 

 ceedings from the actual laying of the 

 egg blunt end foremost, as one might 

 not have supposed the mantle of albumen 

 or * white,' the double skin which gives the 

 egg its final size and shape, and the shell 

 itself are added by successive deposits. 



All this time the rounded cells of life 

 have been breaking up and increasing 

 apace, but now, exposed to the cold of 

 the outer world their activity ceases until 

 once more called into play by the warmth 

 of incubation. In the first five days of 

 this renewed activity the vital parts of the 

 animal are all evolved, brain, eye, lungs, 

 liver, stomach and nervous system ; only, 

 strangely enough, no marks by which one 

 may know the bird have yet appeared ; 

 the embryo is still of a type common 

 among mammals in general, and further 

 is hardly to be distinguished from some 

 of the reptiles at a similar stage of develop- 

 ment. 



Only on the sixth day do those changes 

 begin to take place that shall determine 



