CHAPTER V. 



CLASSIFICATION OF BIRDS. 



In this we shall adopt chiefly the arrangement of 

 Cuvier, not that it is perfect, or even free from objec- 

 tion in all its parts, but because the well-earned 

 celebrity of its author has given it a stability in the 

 general opinion of mankind, the overturning of which 

 would require much knowledge and more hardihood; 

 and be, till more knowledge is obtained, after all a 

 work of supererogation, except in some of the details ; 

 and, in order that the external distinctions of birds 

 maybe seen, a figure of one characteristic specimen of 

 each division is inserted. 



Cuvier divides the whole class into five orders, — 

 Birds of prey ( Accipitres) ; sparrow-like, or hopping 

 birds (Passeres) ; climbing birds (Scansores) ; 

 poultry birds (Gallinid^) ; running and wading 

 birds (Grallid^) ; and web-footed birds (Palmi- 

 pedes). This certainly has the advantage of that 

 simplicity of which it partakes in common with other 

 artificial systems of the works of nature, that the first 

 step in the knowledge of it is very easily taken. But 

 it has, at the same time, all the counterbalancing dis- 

 advantages. It does not simplify the knowledge of 

 birds ; it is only simple because it conveys very 

 little knowledge. When we come to grapple with 

 the real knowledge, we must go to more minute 



