Citizen Bird: Scenes from Bird-Life in Plain English for Beginners. Elliott Coues
FIG. 12: Curved Probing Bill of Curlew; 13. Spearing Bill Of Green Heron; 14. Strainer Bill of Duck; 15. Hooked Bill Of Gull; 16. Ornamental Bill of Male Puffin in Breeding Season.
"I know!" exclaimed Dodo, "toe-nails! Only I think they need cutting!"
"Of course they are toe-nails," said the Doctor. "Don't nails grow on the ends of toes? All kinds of claws, on the ends of birds' and other animals' toes, are the same as nails. Some are long, sharp, and curved, like a cat's or a Sparrow's, and some are flat and blunt, like ours. I could show you some birds with claws that look just like our finger-nails. Toes, too, are pretty much the same; only this Sparrow, like most other birds, has but four, with three of them in a line in front, and the other one pointing backward. That is what makes its foot as good as a hand to hold on with when it perches on slender twigs. Almost all birds have their toes fixed that way. Some, that do not perch, have no hind toe; and birds that swim have broad webs stretched between their front toes, like Ducks. All the different kinds of feet birds have are fitted for the ways they move about on the ground, or water, or among the branches of trees and bushes, just as all their shapes of beaks are fitted for the kind of food they eat and the way they pick it up. Here are two pictures that will show you several different kinds of feet. Now you must answer the next question, Nat; what do toes grow on?"
"Feet!" said Nat promptly, then adding: "But this Sparrow hasn't any feet except its toes; they grow on its legs, because the rest of the horny part stands up—I've noticed that in Canaries."
"But all this horny part is the foot, not the leg," answered the Doctor, "though it does stand up, as you say. How could toes grow from legs without any feet between? They never do! There has to be a foot in every animal between the toes and the legs. Now what do you call the end of your foot which is opposite the end on which the toes grow?"
FIG. 1. Ordinary Foot of Perching Birds; 2. Foot Of Nighthawk, With a Comb on Claw of Middle Toe; 3. Climbing Foot Of Woodpecker, With Two Hind Toes; 4. Grasping Foot of Osprey, for Holding Prey.
FIG. 5. Scratching Foot of Ruffed Grouse; 6. Wading Foot Of Golden Plover, With Only Three Toes; 7. Wading Foot of Snipe, With Short Hind Toe; 8. Wading Foot of Green Heron, With Long Hind Toe; 9. Swimming Foot of Coot, With Lobed Toes; 10. Swimming Foot Of Canada Goose, With Three Toes Webbed; 11. Swimming Foot of Cormorant, With All Four Toes Webbed.
"It's the heel in people, but I should think the hind toe of a bird was its heel," said Nat doubtfully, and beginning to think he did not understand.
"You might think so," said the Doctor; "but you would be wrong. All this horny part that a bird stands up on is its foot. And the top of it, nearest to the feathers, is the heel. Don't you see, when I bend the foot so," continued the Doctor, as he bent the Sparrow's foot forward, "that the top of the horny part makes a joint that stands out backward, in the same position your heel always has? All this slender horny part of the foot, above the roots of the toes, corresponds to the instep of your foot, and of course the heel comes next. You must remember the name of it—the Wise Men call it the tarsus."
"Then hasn't a bird got any legs, Uncle Roy, only just feet?" asked Dodo.
"Oh! yes; legs too, with a knee-joint and a hip-joint, like ours. But all these parts are up closer to the body, and hidden by the feathers, so that you cannot see them."
As the Doctor said this there was a great commotion. Quick, who had been watching the mouse hole all the while, gave a sharp bark and pounced on something. There was a feeble squeak, and it was all over with a mouse which had ventured too far from its hole.
"Poor little mousey!" said the Doctor, as he took the limp body from the terrier's mouth. "It is quite dead. I am sorry, but it might have nibbled some of my birds. Besides, this is exactly what I wanted to teach you something about. Who can tell me the difference between a mouse and a Sparrow?"
"I can!" said Dodo; "it's all difference; a mouse hasn't any feathers, or any wings, and it has four feet, and a long tail and whiskers and teeth—"
"That will do, little girl, for differences; do you see anything alike between a Sparrow and a mouse, Rap?"
"I think the fur is something like feathers, Doctor," answered Rap; "and you told us how a beak was like a mouth without any teeth or lips; then a mouse has four feet and legs; but a bird has only two feet, and two wings instead of four legs and feet like a mouse."
"That is just what I want you all to think about," said the Doctor. "Now listen. If a Sparrow has a pair of feet that correspond to a mouse's hind feet, what do you think a Sparrow's wings correspond to in a mouse?"
"I should think they would be something like a mouse's fore feet," answered Rap, after thinking a moment.
"That is exactly right. Birds and beasts are alike in many respects. They have heads, necks, and bodies; they have tails; and they have limbs. Beasts have two pairs of limbs. We call them fore legs and hind legs. People have two pairs also. We call them arms and legs. So you see our arms correspond to the fore legs of beasts, though we never use them for moving about, except when we go on our hands and knees, or climb trees, or swim in the water. And as for birds—why, their fore limbs are turned into wings, to fly with, so that they walk or hop on their hind limbs only, just as we do. Animals that go on all fours are called quadrupeds. Animals that go on their two hind limbs only, like Bird People and House People, are called bipeds. A Sparrow's wings are just as much like a mouse's fore legs, as a Sparrow's feathers are like a mouse's fur."
"How funny!" said Dodo. "But how are a bird's wings like fore legs, when they haven't got any paws or toes—or fingers—or claws—only just long feathers?"
"They have fingers, and some birds' wings have claws; only you cannot see them, because they are all wrapped up in the skin and covered over with the feathers. Some day—not to-day, because you have had a long lesson already—I will show you a bird's wing with only its bones. Then you will see that it has finger-bones at the end, then hand-bones next, then bones that run from the wrist to the elbow, and then one bone that runs from the elbow to the shoulder—almost the same bones that people have in their fingers, hands, wrists, and arms. So you see wings are the same to a bird that fore legs are to a mouse or arms are to us.
"I could go through all the inside parts of birds, and show you something like the same parts in people—stomach and bowels, to take care of the food they eat and turn it into blood to nourish them; lungs to breathe with, and keep the blood pure; heart to beat and thus pump the warm blood into all parts of the body; brain and nerves, which are what birds think and feel with, just as we do with ours; and all their bones, which together make what we call the skeleton, or framework of the body, to keep the flesh in shape and support the other organs."
"Dear me!" sighed Dodo; "there must be ever so many more things inside of birds that we can't see, than there are outside."
"Of course there are!" said the Doctor. "It won't be very hard for you to remember the outside parts, and learn the names of them all. I have told you most of them that you need to remember, to understand the stories I am going to tell you about birds. See here! What do you think of this?"
So saying, the Doctor unrolled a large sheet of drawing-paper that hung on the wall. "Here is a picture of the White-throated Sparrow, drawn so big you can see it almost across the room, with all the outside parts of which you must learn the names. You see the names are all on the picture, too; I am going to make it smaller, and put it in the book I will write for you, so you can look at it whenever you wish.
"It is almost dinner-time now, and you must be very hungry. But now I must tell you one thing more. You know there are so many, many different kinds of birds and other animals