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ORDER V. 

 OMNIYOR^E, OR OMNIVOROUS BIRDS. 



THE CROW TRIBE, AND BIRDS OF SIMILAR HABITS. 



OMNIVOROUS is a vague, and not a very applicable expres- 

 sion; for there is not, of course, any bird or other animal 

 that can eat " everything," neither is there any species of bird 

 that has not some favourite description of food, of which, 

 when it can be had, the bird is fonder than of anything else. 

 Most birds, too, are somewhat miscellaneous in their feeding; 

 and there are probably none which cannot, when compelled 

 by hunger, subsist upon food which they reject when they 

 have abundance of that which they like better. 



But after the orders that have been already noticed, it is 

 not very easy to select names descriptive of those particulars 

 in which tribes of birds resemble each other too slightly, 

 and with too many variations for allowing them to be 

 included in the same genus, and yet having so much simi- 

 larity that the description of one serves partly for that of 

 the others. This is the practical use of forming birds into 

 orders ; and if the name can be made expressive of some very 

 general and obvious property, such as that of killing prey in 

 the rapacious birds, it is so much the better; but when that 

 cannot be done, a more vague term must be used, and ren- 

 dered as definite as possible by definition. 



It is in this sense that the term omnivorous must be taken. 

 These birds are more miscellaneous in their feeding than any 



