LECTURE VI. g07 



nished with rather broad claws, formed for scratch- 

 ing up the ground in search of food, and other 

 purposes: these birds have also in general more 

 than twelve feathers in the tail, in which par- 

 ticular they resemble the vveb-footed birds. The 

 Gallinaceous birds feed chiefly on grains and seeds, 

 and sometimes on insects : they build a nest of a 

 careless structure, and in general lay numerous 

 eggs. This tribe of birds is considered by Lin- 

 naeus as analogous to the tribe of Pecora or Ru- 

 minants among Quadrupeds. It is remarkable 

 that, according to the old Mosaic Law, these 

 birds alone were considered as pure, or proper 

 for human food. 



Of the common domestic fowl, of which the 

 history and manners are too well known to require 

 particular illustration, we need only observe 

 that it is of East Indian extraction, and still 

 occurs in its natural or wild state in some of the 

 East Indian islands. In this state it is generally 

 of a dark or blackish grey colour, barred and 

 streaked with white variegations, and the narrow 

 feathers of the neck have the shafts or middles 

 dilated into a kind of horny tip. In its domestic 

 state it is well known to run into very numerous 



