THE WING OF THE BIRD. 
41 
that thou mayest be perfectly happy — none other bird but thou 
can at once soar and sing — and heavenward thou seemest to be 
borne, not more by those twinkling pinions than by the ever-varying, 
ever-deepening melody effusing from 
thy heart." 
But while conceding to Professor 
Wilson all that he claims on behalf of 
the lark, we venture to assert that most 
birds, more particularly the smaller : 
species, — we give up the birds of prey, 'Jf \ 
— have a real and obvious delight in % 
their power of swift and unrestrained ^ 
movement. Watch one of our warblers i 
in the glow of a bright warm summer ^ ^ ( -1; ' - 
noon, and mark how he flaps and flutters . ' ' ^ 
his little wings, how he spreads them 
out to their fullest extent, and then ^^t*" \m\ i ij 
how he sweeps hither and thither in . T!'' ''^i'Tflitl 
airy graceful curves, now rising and now /. ^ i * 'f/ 
sinking, now speeding onwards for a ' '' ' 
1 o LARK. 
short distance as straight as the flight 
of an arrow, now balancing in the air like a boat on the surface of 
the water, — and say whether the bird does not fully enjoy the special 
gift which he has received from bountiful Nature ! 
THE WING. 
Something must now be said about that wonderful instrument 
of progression, the wing of the bird, which is at once so light and 
so strong, so solid and yet so mobile. The feathers are imbricated, 
like the tiles on a house-roof, and curved upward so as to give the 
wing an arched configuration. When the wing is uplifted, the 
feathers separate so as to let the air pass through them ; when 
it is lowered, they close in together quite compactly, opposing to 
the atmosphere considerable resistance. At each stroke of his wings 
the bird rises ; and as his upper arm, or brachium, moves at the same 
