CHAPTER III 
EVIDENCE OF RELATIONSHIP TO REPTILES 
AFTER all that has been said about the great differ- 
ences between birds and reptiles, the reader may begin 
to think that the points of resemblance are few and 
small, and that the relationship after all may be only 
a distant one. In reality the evidence of a compar- 
atively near relationship is convincing. But it must 
not be expected that the resemblances should be 
as striking as the differences. The latter are due 
mainly, perhaps entirely, to natural selection working 
during long ages and gradually suiting the bird’s 
structure to new conditions of life and changing habits. 
The metamorphosis produced is so great that to the 
untrained eye the bird has been altered almost beyond 
recognition. The points of resemblance are ancestral 
peculiarities that have survived all changes of habit. 
Not being connected, as a rule, with the new and 
more brilliant life of the ennobled race, it is only to be 
expected that they should be comparatively incon- 
spicuous or of the nature of mere rudiments. Before 
mentioning these marks of reptilian origin it will be 
