The natural history of birds / Robert Mudie.

  • Robert Mudie
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The natural history of birds / Robert Mudie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    74/432 (page 54)
    BODY, OR TRUNK. those of the point of the bill in some birds ; and when we consider that, by the aid of its other me- chanism, and without any apparatus but what God has given it in its own structure, it will strike prey under the birch in Lapland, and again perform the same feat under the palm by the bank of the Niger, before the same spot of earth has thrice seen the sun, it is passing wonderful, and should, even under the worst of the little casualties of life, make us grateful to God for giving us such things for our contemplation. THE BODY, OR TRUNK. The body of birds, that is, the dorsal and the lumbar portion of the spine, upon which the body or trunk may be said to be articulated, has no specific action to perform in what may be termed the working motions. Hence, though it is composed of vertebrae, and by that means less liable to fracture than if it were a single bone of the same substance, the vertebrae admit of little motion, most of them are soldered together, and some of the junctions in time become ossified. It is the same with the sternum or principal bone on the under part. That is very large, and consists of five bones, which are closely united from the first, and ultimately soldered into one. One of these occupies the centre, two the sides anteriorly, and two posteriorly, the latter being forked at their posterior edges, though in some species the termina- tions of the forks are united by bone. The sternum in birds is a very important bone. One of its uses is to support the muscles which move the wings in dy- ing; another to protect the contents of the body from injury or pressure from beneath, and a third to give support and firmness to them. From the number and