CROWS AS EXPERIMENTERS 59 



bird modified into a bird of prey, and even yet 

 " mislodging music in a pitiless breast." Unlike 

 the typical true birds of prey, however, it seizes 

 with the bill, not the feet, which differ little from 

 those of ordinary passerine birds. 



The foot-grasping habit is so rooted in most of 

 the birds of prey proper that even the insectivorous 

 ones catch their small prey with the feet ; it is a 

 common and absurd sight in India when the white- 

 ants or :termites are swarming, to see such big 

 birds as Kites {Mihus gevinda) catching these tiny 

 ithings in their raptorial talons, with which they can 

 grip and carry off a rat. 



There are, however, cases in which the adapta- 

 tion here is not complete ; the Caracara Hawk of 

 America {Polyborus tharus), though seizing birds on 

 the wing with the feet — a feat it seldom performs, 

 .by the way— picks up ground-prey with its beak, 

 afterwards transferring it to the feet when in 

 ^flight, as Mr. Hudson informs us. I have seen the 

 Indian Crow {Corvus ^splendens) thus transfer an 

 iobject from biU to feet, as if he wanted to learn 

 the iKite's trick of foot-carrying ; ibut the object 

 was not ;foQd — fthe Crow is too practical to experi- 

 ment with anything so valuable, and a bit of stick 

 or dry !COW-dung was the subject of the experiment. 



Some very curious specializations in the [feeding 

 habits of birds of prey deserve mention here ; those 

 of the Snail - Hawk (Rostrbamus sociabilis) and 

 Bird's-nesting Eagle (Neapus malayensis). The 

 Snail-Hawk is a iBuzzard-tlike, brown bird with a 



