CLASS AVES. 11 



is the case with the ostriches. The young has at the 

 tip of the beak a homy point, which serves to break 

 the egg, and which falls off a few days after birth. 



Every one knows the varied industry employed by 

 birds in constructing their nests, and the tender care 

 they take of their eggs and of their young : this is 

 the principal part of their instinct. For the rest of 

 their intellectual qualities^ their rapid passage through 

 the different regions of the air, and the lively and 

 continued action of this element upon them, enable 

 them to anticipate the variations of the atmosphere 

 in a manner of which we can have no idea, and from 

 which has been attributed to them, from all antiquity, 

 by superstition, the power of announcing future events. 

 They are not without memory, or imagination, for 

 they dream ; and every one knows with what facility 

 they may be tamed, may be made to perform different 

 operations, and retain airs and words. 



DIVISION OF THE CLASS AVES INTO ORDERS. 



Of all the classes of animals, that of birds is the 

 most strongly marked, and that in which the species 

 have the greatest resemblance, and which is separated 

 from all the others by a wider interval. This fact, 

 however, renders it more difficult to subdivide them. 



These subdivisions are grounded^ as in the mam- 

 malia, on the organs of food, and of prehension, that 

 is, the beak and toes. 



