88 



BIRDS. 



Sect, II. Birds. 



The birds hurtful to the farmer are the rook, the 

 pigeon, the wood-pigeon, and the pheasant." 



The word "fowl " is used to denote the larger, and " bird" 

 the smaller kind of feathered animals. Among naturalists, 

 birds are the second class of animals ; a race of creatures 

 sufficiently distinguished from the others in having the body 

 covered with feathers, and two feet and two wings, formed 

 for flight. Birds have the mandible protracted and naked, 

 and are destitute of external ears, lips, teeth, scrotum, womb, 

 urinary vessel or bladder, epiglottis, corpus callosum, or its 

 fornix, (covering of the two lateral ventricles of the brain or 

 its arch,) and diaphragm. Birds are parted into two large 

 divisions: Land birds, and Water fowl. The first division 

 comprehends six orders. 1. Rapacious; 2. Pies; 3. Gallina- 

 ceous; 4. Culombine; 5. Passerine; 6. Struthious. 



1. The Rook is a species of the genus Gorvus, the 

 crow or raven. It is the " Gorvus frugilegus" of ornithology, 

 of the order Picse. Bill sharp-edged, convexed above ; 

 legs short, strong; feet formed for walking, perching, or 

 chmbing. The generic character: Bill sharp-edged, front- 

 let reversed. The rook is black ; front subcinereous ; tail 

 roundish. It inhabits most parts of Europe, and extends as 

 far as Western Siberia. It is a gregarious bird, and is some- 

 times seen in immense flocks, so numerous as almost to 

 darken the air in their flights, which they regularly perform 

 morning and evening, except in the breeding time, when the 

 daily attendance of both male and female is requisite to the 

 purposes of incubation, or feeding their young. They begin to 

 build their nests in the month of March, at least in England ; 

 and their society seems to be regulated by a complete system 

 of jurisprudence. They seem to have some idea of separate 

 property. No one is allowed to carry off" the materials from 

 another's nest, and every crime against the interests of the 



