The faculties of birds / [Anon].

  • James Rennie
Date:
1847
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The faculties of birds / [Anon]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    extended front, so as to enable them to survey hundreds of acres at once. On the contrary, when the land is richly covered with food, or the trees abundantly hung- with mast, they fly low in order to discover the part most plentifully supplied. Their body is of an elongated oval form, steered by a long well-plumed tail, and propelled by well-set wings, the muscles of which are very large and powerful for the size of the bird. When an individual is seen gliding through the woods, and close to the observer, it passes like a thought, and on trying to see it again, the eye searches in vain ; the bird is gone.” “ As soon,’’ he adds, “ as the pigeons discover a suffi¬ ciency of food to entice them to alight, they fly round in circles reviewing the country below. During their evolutions on such occasions, the dense mass which they form exhibits a beautiful appearance as it changes its direction, now displaying a glistening sheet of azure, when the backs of the birds come simultaneously into view, and anon suddenly presenting a mass of rich deep purple. They then pass lower over the woods, and for a moment are lost among the foliage, but again emerge and are seen gliding aloft*.” The return of the carrier pigeon from such distances to its home is, we think, most plausibly accounted for by its flying in circles ; but that there may be some other manner in which it is directed, is not improbable from what takes place among quadrupeds. Instances, for example, are not uncommon of cats having returned of their own accord to the place from which they have been carried, though at the distance of many miles, and even across rivers, where they could not possibly have had any knowledge either of the road or of the direction that would lead them to it. “ The nature of this beast,” says Gesner, “ is to love the place of her breeding ; neither will she tarry in any strange place, * Ornith. Biugr. p. 323. c 3
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