Bird Sentence Examples
Some large bird has stolen it from his palace.
The regiment fluttered like a bird preening its plumage and became motionless.
I had a mug, and little bird and candy.
Even a bird is smart enough to push the fledgling out of the nest when it fails to fly on its own.
Occasionally, he even lent a hand with the chores at Bird Song.
Napoleon rode on, dreaming of the Moscow that so appealed to his imagination, and "the bird restored to its native fields" galloped to our outposts, inventing on the way all that had not taken place but that he meant to relate to his comrades.
Bird Song was an empty nest.
Bird Song is full.
In the open space between the clouds and the black, bubbling sea far beneath, could be seen an occasional strange bird winging its way swiftly through the air.
He turns into a bird in his hands and flies away.
AdvertisementThe ten-year-old girl had resided at Bird Song with David Dean, his wife Cynthia, and Dean's seventy-seven-year-old stepfather, Fred O'Connor, for the past six months.
In her dream Annie is telling her to stick around Bird Song!
The great bird was high in the air and flying towards the far-off mountains with all his money.
I wanted a bird to remind you of Bird Song, and that you're gonna fly back here real soon.
Dean gave the tableau a wide berth as he continued back to Bird Song, whistling the entire trip.
AdvertisementYou can rest up here at Bird Song—give yourself time enough to make logical decisions.
After dawn arrived at last and the couple were showered and dressed, they speculated further on the late night sounds as Cynthia filled Bird Song's breakfast table with fresh baked goodies.
Edith was as nervous as the prior evening, glancing across the hall at her son, as if danger lurked in every corner of Bird Song.
During the week before Christmas, Martha had spent an overnight at Bird Song when Janet was forced to report to court in Grand Junction, on some charges she, thankfully, did not detail to the Deans.
Dean told her Donnie was a guest at Bird Song and explained the lad, only slightly older than Martha, did not speak.
AdvertisementYou were so nice to us last night and Bird Song feels so warm.
I think she wants me to remain here at Bird Song, at least for a while.
Said you told him his wife wasn't staying at Bird Song.
I told a man on the phone, who didn't identify himself, that Edith Shipton wasn't registered at Bird Song.
Bird Song is in the city of Ouray, not my jurisdiction.
AdvertisementDean returned to Bird Song and brought Cynthia up to date on his conversation with Sheriff Weller over a quiet lunch of soup and grilled cheese.
And then to have Bird Song's first guest turning up dead!
Once the details to that "caper," as Fred O'Connor called it, were settled, life and business at Bird Song had proceeded peacefully.
There were other guests at Bird Song and enough regular problems running a country inn without creating any more.
When the Deans returned to Bird Song, the place was quiet.
As Dean and his young passenger neared Bird Song, Edith Shipton drove up the street, parked, and entered the inn ahead of them.
She hopped out of the car with a quick thanks ran into Bird Song ahead of him.
Whoever the guy in the Blazer was, he gave Edith the look-see when he drove past Bird Song.
It was a gift from a young lady whom he'd helped when Bird Song first opened.
The bearded man was younger looking than Dean had thought when he first saw him drive by Bird Song, probably no more than late twenties.
It had been originally designed as a maid's quarters and it was the last room they rented when Bird Song was otherwise booked.
Cynthia was still on the phone so after Dean introduced himself he completed the paperwork, without comment or acknowledgment that he knew Ryland's relationship to Bird Song's other guest Edith Shipton and her son.
While the need for such meetings wasn't as dire or sinister as the first few days after Bird Song's opening, the three still gathered here, away from the guests, especially when they wished to discuss one or more of their paying customers beyond their prying ears.
That's why I came over to Bird Song.
That's the way a left-handed person pours and Edith is the only lefty at Bird Song.
Dean started to get out of the car but Weller waved him on and Ryland pulled away from Bird Song.
When her son Randy, visiting Bird Song over his Christmas college break, had expressed an interest in the sport, she had a fit.
Bird Song was now officially at full capacity and would remain so for the next few days.
Their suppertime chatter was limited to the logistics of Bird Song and the care and breakfast feeding of its thirteen guests.
I haven't had a chance with Bird Song packed like a sardine can.
With Bird Song being full, much as I'd like to get to know Miss Annie a little better, she'll have to wait in line.
She said she thought Bird Song held spirits, too.
I'm afraid I'd get evicted from Bird Song, if and when I made it back!
The rest of the climbers followed in the truck but Ryland declined to join them, turning a perturbed eye to Bird Song.
The group walked up to the ice park climbing area from Bird Song.
Finally, it was acknowledged she would return to Bird Song alone.
The other climbers from Bird Song were already here.
But I intend to stay at Bird Song.
They were alone in the kitchen of Bird Song.
I just hope he stays away from her, and Bird Song.
You know, I dreamed Jerome came here, to Bird Song, last night.
We don't want to give Bird Song the wrong reputation and have Sheriff Jake Weller down here busting the place.
Dean pulled Janet aside and asked if she had let any strangers into Bird Song the prior afternoon.
Your marital difficulties aren't our business but Bird Song is and we don't want any hint of trouble here.
Now that the busy morning activity no longer occupied Cynthia's mind, she again was visibly upset about Bird Song's latest guest, Jerome Shipton, and the penchant for trouble that surrounded his presence.
He offered an exchange for a later getaway weekend at Bird Song for the man and his wife.
I'm more interested in live people and guests in Bird Song, not some revenant.
Across the street, right behind the Western Hotel, you had The Bird Cage, The Bon Ton, The Temple of Music and then Ashenfelter's stables that Annie mentions hearing the men loading the pack animals.
Maybe now they'll all check out of Bird Song and things will return to normal.
Bird, The Annals of Natal, 1 495 to 1845 (2 vols., Maritzburg, 1888), a work of permanent value, consisting of official records, &c.; Shepstone, Historic Sketch of Natal (1864).
Bird life is represented chiefly by migratory species, particularly of genera that inhabit the shores of streams and lagoons.
In many cases it appears that only the brilliantly coloured tentacle is pecked off by the bird, and as the snail can easily regenerate a new one, this in turn becomes infected by a fresh branch of the sporocyst ramifying through the snail and thus a new supply of larvae is speedily provided (Heckert).
The mocking bird does not live in the cold north.
After all, he'd abdicated all Bird Song's weekend chores in favor of his flesh-pressing tour, and Cynthia deserved a rest.
A number of Bird Song's more recent guests were bickering over differing rules to Mexican Train Dominoes in the dining room while others were trading Boardwalk and Park Place in the parlor.
I was sure you'd whack the son of a bitch and maybe kill him and I didn't want to be a jailhouse widow and run Bird Song alone.
The phone was as busy as the Bird Song household this Monday morning.
When Dean returned to Bird Song, it was mid-morning, but if he expected a quiet empty building with the Dawkinses at the courthouse and the rest of the clientele enjoying the splendors of Ouray, he was wrong.
Cynthia and I will call a lawyer when I get back to Bird Song.
Cynthia was waiting for Dean at Bird Song—a message left at the library had alerted her to Fred's arrest.
Dean left Bird Song on foot, passing up the temptation to drive his Jeep the short distance to the Main Street delicatessen.
Supper was picked-at leftovers, and neither felt like socializing with Bird Song's guests, who came and went on their own, without their usual afternoon goodies and conversation.
I want to make reservations at Bird Song for a week in August.
When conversation lagged, they apparently took the hint and retreated into Bird Song.
Bird Song switched a few guest, baked a few goodies, cleaned a few toilets and made a few beds, all with a been-there, done-that regularity.
You folks at Bird Song can get into more pickles than any group I know.
Then he added, You might have better luck learning who's been trying to buy the worthless mine and who at Bird Song swiped the itsy-bitsy bone you found.
Like that weird kid you had staying at Bird Song—the one with the shopping cart.
The real celebration of Fred's release from jail didn't begin until the pair returned to Bird Song where Cynthia had baked a fresh apple pie, complete with vanilla ice cream, tagged on to the end of a healthy lunch.
He was back at Bird Song and all was right with the world.
The trio continued to click down the list of people at Bird Song who were around when the bone fragment theft was discovered.
There was attorney Faust but there was no proof he had even set foot in Bird Song.
In celebration of Fred's return to Bird Song, Dean didn't bother to protest.
In spite of the good news of Fred's return, the pall of Martha's continued absence draped over Bird Song.
It read, I want my kid Martha Boyd to live of the deans at Bird Song in Colorado.
Brandon Westlake, the only other guest of long standing, was off on an early morning photo shoot but an unexpected prodigal returned to Bird Song just as the second batch of cinnamon rolls rolled out of the oven.
Dean's feelings were mixed about Pumpkin's visit but on the plus side, there were a few more bucks in Bird Song's bank account.
He explained no cigarettes were found with the remains Fitzgerald brought to Bird Song nor was there any such evidence when the Deans visited the site.
Dean stewed over the question as the business of Bird Song continued.
She turned to the right, up the unpaved Camp Bird Mine Road.
She screeched to a stop at Bird Song and was off almost before he was out of the vehicle.
July stretched into August, and just before the election, Jennifer Radisson spent her promised week at Bird Song.
Before Dean could contact Lydia to offer his congratulations, she visited Bird Song the day after Cynthia returned.
She followed, startled, only to see a massive black bird the size of a pterodactyl coasting along the tops of the waves.
Turn into a bird and carry me with you? she asked.
He jogged through the castle and ran out into the snow, launching himself into the cold air as he changed into the bird form.
Her gaze went to the sky, where the demon bird had appeared in her dream.
With a curse, he rose and ran to the courtyard, changing into his demon bird.
Turn into a bird and carry me with you? she asked, desperation in her voice.
He had been outside, atop a ladder, removing Christmas lights when the two checked in to Bird Song, the Dean's bed and breakfast.
After extensive alterations, Bird Song, a bed and breakfast, was born.
Bird Song's going to be close to empty for a few more days until the ice climbers arrive.
Dean started to protest but his wife began carrying the packed ornaments from the room and asked in her sweetest tone if he could remove the now-dried Christmas tree and finish a short list of Bird Song chores she'd drawn up earlier.
I booked two more rooms for Bird Song as a result of it!
They're coming to Bird Song, just because of that important merchandise you called junk!
What did you tell them to get them so excited they want to travel all the way to Ouray Colorado and Bird Song?
You told these ladies that this Annie Quincy woman probably lived here in Bird Song?
We don't know what Bird Song was at the turn of the century, just that there was a building or some sort on this site.
Even if Bird Song was a boarding house, there must have been scores of lodging places just like it.
Her comments brought to mind the death of Bird Song's very first guest and the strange events that followed.
The couple was back in Bird Song by seven o'clock.
I was telling Mrs. Edith about these here letters and how the two ladies from Boston will be coming to Bird Song.
There were lots of rooming houses but we have no idea how Bird Song was utilized at the turn of the century.
The darkening sky matched the mood of Bird Song's guests and inhabitants as they woke to a busy Saturday morning, the main day of the ice festival.
Donnie had pretty well taken over the project as the chores of Bird Song limited Cynthia's time.
We'd lose Bird Song!
Bird Song was as quiet as a tomb, with Janet either the most silent domestic on record or snoozing away in an unoccupied room.
Yeah. She's run down to Bird Song.
When Dean rushed into Bird Song, Cynthia was standing in the hall, the phone at her ear.
By that time, most of the ice climbers were back at Bird Song.
Cynthia would go alone—that was a given with Bird Song requiring Dean's attention.
And don't you worry none about Bird Song.
After a call to Fred at Bird Song and the necessary schedule changes, they once again boarded the Jeep for the one-hour ride.
They both loved Ouray, the Colorado mountains and hosting the guests of Bird Song, at least most of them.
The snow continued to fall as Dean pulled in front of Bird Song, angled his Jeep as best he could in the drifts, and climbed to the porch.
The climbers are checking out of Bird Song tomorrow.
The way I see it, someone from Bird Song cut his rope.
Thankfully, Janet arrived to take up the inside tasks of Bird Song.
He left Bird Song, telling Janet where he was going and together with Fred, hiked up to the ice park to where Shipton had fallen.
Two unmarked State cars were parked in front of Bird Song, along with, to Dean's surprise, Edith's rental car and Donald Ryland's Explorer.
Why did Mrs. Shipton choose Bird Song to visit?
I didn't lie to him when I told him no one named Shipton was registered at Bird Song but I saw no reason to go out of my way and help him either.
Most of Bird Song's other guests remained, as requested, in their own rooms but Ryland hung around the kitchen, sharing a snack of take-out pizza with Donnie while Edith sat nearby, wringing her hands and looking petrified.
He hadn't spoken to Edith Shipton since her husband's accident and felt, as the host of Bird Song, he owed the woman some sort of condolence.
Both high-stepped their way through the deep snow to the plowed alley in the rear of Bird Song.
Unless they arrest me, I'm still in Bird Song, and that's where all the action is right at the moment.
Dean felt the beginnings of a headache creep along the base of his neck as he tried to concentrate on who, among the cast of characters cloistered snugly in Bird Song, might have been responsible for Jerome Shipton's fall.
Dean took a look at the thawing street in front of Bird Song and went out back and unhooked his bicycle.
He was pleased he'd accepted Fred's offer to stay away from Bird Song.
If you're looking for an update on what's happening at Bird Song, you're out of luck.
Cynthia and the old man do more running Bird Song than you and I'll bet you could use the dough.
As Dean drew close to Bird Song, he resolved to ask his wife point blank if she witnessed Donnie Ryland cutting his stepfather's climbing rope in an attempt to send him to his death.
A small red sports car skidded to a stop in front of Bird Song as Dean dismounted his bike.
I'm sorry about all this but we don't need any more trouble at Bird Song.
There was a moment of realization as he understood her brave actions, and then a snap as the line let loose and he tumbled backwards like some mortally wounded game bird shot from the sky, arms outstretched, scream muffled in his mask.
Pleased to meet any friend of Donnie's and Bird Song.
Dean continued to hold Martha's hand as they walked uptown and found a place open on Seventh Avenue, a couple of blocks from Bird Song.
It had something to do with Bird Song and I think she was afraid you'd fire her.
When the two returned to Bird Song, Donnie met Martha at the stairs and tugged her up to his and Edith's second floor room.
Bird Song was as quiet as an empty church with none of the remaining guests in evidence, nor was there any sign the police had returned.
As he strolled away from Bird Song, Corday pulled up in front.
After trying Cynthia one more time, he gave up and returned to Bird Song.
Everyone else was apparently asleep as Bird Song was as quiet as a tomb.
Dean's mind churned the details of the recent happenings, trying to make sense of Shipton's orchestrated plunge to the river, and the strange reactions of those still sleeping beneath Bird Song's roof, and elsewhere.
He just wanted his wife back in Bird Song.
He lay there, trying to comprehend if the noise were in his mind's fantasies or in the real world of Bird Song.
Unless you're going to charge me with something, get the hell out of Bird Song and leave me alone.
He paused and said a silent prayer for the spirit of this person who had brought so much grief to Bird Song and his previously contented life.
Later, Dean heard the movement of the mortuary men coming for Edith—the hushed conversation and the bumping and thumping as the lifeless shell of this troubled woman was bagged and forever removed from Bird Song.
She even used the same fountain pen she used when she registered here at Bird Song, when she signed 'Edith Jones.'
He leaned across the coffee table and reached for Bird Song's guest register, handing it to Dean.
Cynthia had given him such an instrument at the time the couple signed papers acquiring Bird Song.
Too bad she decided to do it here at Bird Song.
Maybe now you can get back to the future, and running Bird Song.
All of Bird Song was in the room.
Dean spent the afternoon busying himself with the chores of Bird Song, partially out of guilt for having dumped the morning duties on Fred and in part to take his mind off the ever-present feeling he'd caused long term or, heaven forbid, permanent damage to his seven-month marriage.
In spite of all his cleaning, Bird Song didn't seem to have the same shine as it did when Cynthia was in residence.
Instead, he returned to Bird Song to once more try to contact his wife.
Edith Shipton was a very troubled woman, from the first time she stepped into Bird Song.
Besides, we have to accommodate the wishes of the guests of Bird Song, don't we?
If it was Bird Song where Annie lived, perhaps the scratched window pane is still here!
Even if it was Bird Song where she stayed, the place must have been altered a dozen times in the last century.
But more than anything else, there was love at Bird Song.
Do you believe Annie died at Bird Song?
Okay. I'll buy that they're up there keeping an eye on Bird Song and watching out for us.
At least Edith Shipton was alive before she visited Bird Song.
When they entered Bird Song Fred was still in place on the sofa, but as soon as he saw them he jumped up and embraced Cynthia like the returning prodigal child.
It was time for the Deans to talk, to enjoy one another, the first real time together since their May wedding and hectic summer and fall that followed their move West and the opening of Bird Song.
Bird Song, while providing a simple living for them, was never going to bring a fortune to their bank account.
Gladys Turnbull remained Bird Song's sole paying guest, at least for a couple of days longer.
She had joined the three hosts for a game of dominoes when Bird Song welcomed a new guest.
Martha became settled into Bird Song's routine with amazing rapidity.
All of Edith Shipton's belongings were still packed in a closet at Bird Song.
Dean helped Weller carry the remaining articles into Bird Song.
The following weekend, two and a half weeks after Edith's death, Penny and Mick returned to bird Song for a couple of days of ice climbing, a further reminder of the ice park incident.
Come by Bird Song and we'll have to arrange for her to go back with you.
His first inclination was to stay as far away from Bird Song as possible until Shipton was long gone.
As Dean peddled up to Bird Song, he saw no unfamiliar cars.
He even apologized for not calling before he stopped by and for not staying at Bird Song, like maybe he'd be welcomed.
Said it was for all the trouble he and his wife caused Bird Song.
And you still had a key to Bird Song.
I should have remembered you still had your key to Bird Song.
You must have just guessed what happened after I just stopped by Bird Song.
He practically raped her the night he first stayed in Bird Song.
Then off the newborn goes to start a life of vampirism, just like a bird leaving the nest.
Apparently he thought she was heartless, as well - over a stupid bird?
Elise didn't give the bird call they'd agreed on, so Lana said nothing.
The sound of something screaming wiped the smile from Deidre's face. Katie turned to face the direction from which the sound came. It wasn't a bird, and it wasn't human. The single voice was joined by several, and Katie grabbed Deidre's hand.
David and Cynthia Dean, now husband and wife, and owners of Bird Song, a bed and breakfast in Ouray, Colorado, were seated in the Tundra Room of the recently restored Beaumont Hotel.
The only sound was that of Ed walking and an occasional winter bird song.
A bird's nest was built on one end and cobwebs covered the window.
No darkness lasts the ages, Taran…I do not care to remember the sound of a bird's cry, but I wish I remembered the taste of spiced ale.
A bird built a nest in the flower box and it has little baby birds!
Mama bird will be back to feed them.
A bird came and brought a great big worm.
She cleaned the table and then went out to the porch to remove an empty bird nest from the eve.
I was trying to remove that bird's nest.
She glanced down at the bird nest in her hand.
As a child she had wanted a bird.
She was like a walking rectangle with a bird face, and she got outright hostile towards the beautiful women she escorted out of his home every morning.
In 1862 he succeeded John Bird Sumner as archbishop of Canterbury.
The swan played a part in classical mythology as the bird of Apollo, and in Scandinavian lore the swan maidens, who have the gift of prophecy and are sometimes confused with the Valkyries, reappear again and again.
This odd animal is provided with a bill or beak, which is not, like that of a bird, affixed to the skeleton, but is merely attached to the skin and muscles.
No word exists in their language for such general terms as tree, bird or fish; yet they have invented a name for every species of vegetable and animal they know.
This formality having been gone through, the flight of the first bird which passed over the body was watched, the direction being regarded as that in which the sorcerer must be sought.
On the east coast peafowl are found, and throughout the interior the argus pheasant, the firebacked pheasant, the blue partridge, the adjutantbird, several kinds of heron and crane, duck, teal, cotton-teal, snipe, wood-pigeon, green-pigeon of several varieties, swifts, swallows pied-robins, hornbills, parakeets, fly-catchers, nightjars, and many other kinds of bird are met with frequently.
A few specimens of solitary goose have been procured, but the bird is rarely met with.
Prominent among a great variety of song-birds and insectivorous birds are the robin, blue bird, cat bird, sparrows, meadow-lark, bobolink, thrushes, chickadee, wrens, brown thrasher, gold finch, cedar wax-wing, flycatchers, nuthatches, flicker (golden-winged woodpecker), downy and hairy woodpeckers, rose-breasted grosbeak, Baltimore oriole, barnswallow, chimney swift, purple martin, purple finch (linnet), vireos and several species of warblers.
Two more species of Hylactes are known, and 1 Of Spanish origin, it is intended as a reproof to the bird for the shameless way in which, by erecting its tail, it exposes its hinder parts.
It has been sometimes misspelt "Tapacolo," as by C. Darwin, who gave (Journal of Researches, chap. xii.) a brief but entertaining account of the habits of this bird and its relative, Hylactes megapodius, called by the Chilenos "El Turco."
The altar itself is constructed in the form of a bird, because Soma was supposed to have been brought down from heaven by the metre Gayatri which had assumed the form of an eagle.
The consequence of this intussusceptive growth is the " development " or " evolution " of the germ into the visible bird.
Certain ancient stringed instruments were played with a plectrum or plucker made of the quill of a bird's feather, and the word has thus been used of a plectrum made of other material and differing in shape, and also of an analogous object for striking the strings in the harpsichord, spinet or virginal.
One general feature of the adult bird's skull is the almost complete disappearance of the sutures between the bones of the cranium proper, whilst another is the great movability of the whole palatal and other suspensorial apparatus.
Similarly during the growth of the bird the posterior end of the ilium connects itself with the transverse processes of vertebrae which were originally free, thus transforming them from caudals into secondary post-sacrals.
It is absent in the Ratitae, which from this feature have received their name, but considerable traces of a cartilaginous keel occur in the embryo of the ostrich, showing undeniably that the absence of a keel in the recent bird is not a primitive, fundamental feature.
The coracoid is one of the most characteristic bones of the bird's skeleton.
Of wrist-bones only two remain in the adult bird; the original distal carpals coalesce with the proximal end of the metacarpals.
The wing of the bird is folded in a unique way, namely, the radius parallel with the humerus, and the whole wrist and hand with their ulnar side against the ulna; upper and forearm in a state of supination, the hand in that of strong abduction.
The iris is in most young birds at first brown or dull-coloured, but with maturity attains often very bright tints which add considerably to the charm of the bird; sexual dimorphism is in this respect of common occurrence.
During the embryonic stage the lids are fused together, and either become separated shortly before the bird is hatched, as is the case with most Nidifugae, or else the blind condition prevails for some time, in the young Nidicolae.
The bird's liver receives nearly all the blood from the stomach, gut, pancreas and spleen, as well as from the left liver itself, into the right hepatic lobe, by a right and left portal vein.
The usual suggestion, that the warm air contained within them assists the bird in flight, balloon-like, is absurd.
But it also follows that, if every extinct and recent bird were known, neither species, nor genera, nor families, nor orders could be defined.
Marsh, who, after 1870, discovered a great number of bird remains in the Cretaceous strata of North America.
The oldest known bird is theArchaeopteryx, of the upper Oolite in Bavaria.
A wide gap separates Archaeopteryx from the next order of fossil birds of the Cretaceous epoch, and, since freshwater deposits of that age are rare, bird remains are uncommon.
The lower Eocene has furnished a greater number of bird bones.
Remnants of a heron-like bird, Proherodius, of a gull-like creature, Halcyornis, a raptorial Lithornis; and a supposed Passerine from Glarus in Switzerland, called Protornis = Osteornis, complete the list.
The fossil egg of a struthious bird, Struthiolithus, has been found near Cherson, south Russia, and in north China.
In the fens of East Anglia have been found two humeri, one of them immature, of a true Pelecanus, a bird now no longer inhabiting middle Europe.
New Zealand has also yielded many flightless birds, notably the numerous species and genera of Dinornithidae, some of which survived into the 19th century; Pseudapteryx allied to the Kiwi; Cnemiornis, a big, flightless goose; Aptornis and Notornis, flightless rails; and Harpagornis, a truly gigantic bird of prey with tremendous wings and talons.
These are, again in an ascending direction, connected with the Coraciiformes, out of which have arisen the Passeriformes, and these have blossomed into the Oscines, which, as the apotheosis of bird life, have conquered the whole inhabitable world.
The principal crops in addition to wheat are oats, barley, maize, linseed and bird seed.
As a wild bird it breeds constantly, though locally, throughout the greater part of Scotland, and has frequently done so in England, but more rarely in Ireland.
A common and handsome bird is the blue plantain-eater (Corythaeola).
This Strophanthus is not remarkable for its rubber - which is mere bird lime - but for the powerful poison of its seeds, often used for poisoning arrows, but of late much in use as a drug for treating diseases of the heart.
Still it is brisk in its movements, and its variegated plumage makes it a pleasing bird.
The nest, contrary to the habits of most Limicolae, is generally placed under a ledge of rock which shelters the bird from observation,' and therein are laid four eggs, of a light olive-green, closely blotched with brown, and hardly to be mistaken for those of any other bird.
In like manner in the purification of lepers two birds were used; the throat of one was cut, the living bird dipped in the blood mingled with water and the leper sprinkled; then the bird was set free to carry away the leprosy.
In the Centaur battle, having been crushed by rocks and trunks of trees, he was changed into a bird; or he disappeared into the depths of the earth unharmed.
The bird fauna is of considerable interest, the finest species of the upper zone being an eagle-owl, met with at 14,000 ft.
Many bird parasites belonging to the Rippoboscidae have naturally been carried about the world by their hosts, while other species, such as the house-fly, blow-fly and drone-fly, have in like manner been disseminated by human agency.
Of birds some 30 kinds are known, an owl being the only bird of prey; parrots, pigeons, kingfishers, honey-suckers, rails, ducks, and other water birds are numerous.
The cock has a fine yellow bill and a head bearing a rounded crest of filamentous feathers; lanceolate scapulars overhang the wings, and from the rump spring the long flowing plumes which are so characteristic of the species, and were so highly prized by the natives before the Spanish conquest that no one was allowed to kill the bird when taken, but only to divest it of its feathers, which were to be worn by the chiefs alone.
Among the song-birds are the mocking-bird, the Carolina wren and the cardinal grosbeak (or red bird); there are plenty of quail or " bob white " (called partridge in the South).
At the consecration of a church the sacrifice of a dove (the bird of Ishtar) has place among the ceremonies.
Thus it became possible for almost any diligent reader without much chance of error to refer to its proper place nearly every bird he was likely to meet with.
In 1783 Boddaert printed at Utrecht a Table des planches enlumineez, 9 in which he attempted to refer every species of bird figured in that extensive series to its proper Linnaean genus, and to assign it a scientific name if it did not already possess one.
The plates, which show no improvement in execution on those of Martinet, are after drawings by Huet and Pretre, the former being perhaps the less bad draughtsman of the two, for he seems to have had an idea of what a bird when alive looks like, though he was not able to give his figures any vitality, while the latter simply delineated the stiff and dishevelled specimens from museum shelves.
He had, however, the courage to act up to his own professions in collocating the rollers (Coracias) with the beeeaters (Merops), and had the sagacity to surmise that Menura was not a Gallinaceous bird.
The points at issue between Cuvier and Etienne Geoffroy St-Hilaire before mentioned naturally attracted the attention of L'Herminier, who in 1836 presented to the French Academy the results of his researches into the mode Isidore of growth of that bone which in the adult bird he had already studied to such good purpose.
On two occasions, however, there was found in addition, what may be taken for a representation of the first series, a little " noyau " situated between the coracoids - forming the only instance of all three series being present in the same bird.
Be that as it may, he declares that characters drawn from the sternum or the pelvis - hitherto deemed to be, next to the bones of the head, the most important portions of the bird's framework - are scarcely worth more, from a classificatory point of view, than characters drawn from the bill or the legs; while pterylological considerations, together with many others to which some systematists had attached more or less importance, can only assist, and apparently must never be taken to control, the force of evidence furnished by this bone of all bones - the anterior palatal.
More dimly still visions of what the first bird may have been like could be reasonably entertained; and, passing even to a higher antiquity, the reptilian parent whence all birds have sprung was brought within reach of man's consciousness.
The common practice of ordinary collectors, until at least very recently, has been tersely described as being to " shoot a bird, take off its skin, and throw away its characters."
C. Marsh, by finding the imperfect fossilized tibia of a bird in the middle cretaceous shale of Kansas, Marsh, began a series of wonderful discoveries of great im portance to ornithology.
It is unnecessary here to discuss the views of Gadow, as that author himself has contributed the article BIRD to this edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and has there set forth his revised scheme.
All the world over it is held that such people can assume the form of animals; sometimes the power of the shaman is held to depend on his being able to summon his familiar; among the Ostiaks the shaman's coat was covered with representations of birds and beasts; two bear's claws were on his hands; his wand was covered with mouse-skin; when he wished to divine he beat his drum till a black bird appeared and perched on his hut; then the shaman swooned, the bird vanished, and the divination could begin.
One genus of Thomisidae (Phognarachne), which inhabits the Oriental region, adopts the clever device of spinning on the surface of a leaf a sheet of web resembling the fluid portions of a splash of bird's dung, the more solid central portions being represented by the spider itself, which waits in the middle of the patch to seize the butterflies or other insects that habitually feed on birds' excrement and are attracted to the patch mistaking it for their natural food.
This bird is exported in large numbers to northern China, where it is much prized on account of its extraordinary power of imitation.
One of the Brazilian birds whose habits have attracted much interest is the Joao de Barro (Clay John) or oven bird (Furnarius rufus), which builds a house of reddish clay for its nest and attaches it to the branch of a tree, usually in a fork.
The largest is the great emerald bird (Paradisea apoda), about the size of the common jay.
The great emerald bird, so far as yet known, is only found in the Aru Islands.
The lesser bird of paradise (Paradisea minor), though smaller in size and somewhat less brilliant in plumage, in other respects closely resembles the preceding species.
The king bird of paradise (Cicinnurus regius) is one of the smallest and most brilliant of the group, and is specially distinguished by its two middle tail feathers, the ends of which alone are webbed, and coiled into a beautiful spiral disk of a lovely emerald green.
In the red bird of paradise (Paradisea rubra) the same feathers are greatly elongated and destitute of webs, but differ from those in the other species, in being flattened out like ribbons.
The pelvis and hind-limbs much resemble those of a running bird, such as those of an emu or the extinct moa; but the basal bones (metatarsals) of the three-toed foot remain separate throughout life, thus differing from those of the running birds, which are firmly fused together even in the young adult.
There is a state game bird farm (1909) near Sherburne in Chenango county.
Outside the forest country the weka, an almost wingless bird, is numerous, and in the Alps a hawk-like green parrot, the kea, has learned to kill sheep and holds its ground.
The albatross is of course the most conspicuous sea bird.
Its eggs are the wellknown "plovers' eggs" of commerce,' and the bird, wary and wild at other times of the year, in the breeding-season becomes easily approachable, and is shot to be sold in the markets for "golden plover."
The lapwing's conspicuous crest seems to have been the cause of a common blunder among English writers of the middle ages, who translated the Latin word Upupa, property hoopoe, by lapwing, as being the crested bird with which they were best acquainted.
The word Vanellus is from vannus, the fan used for winnowing corn, and refers to the audible beating of the bird's wings.
On the ground this bird runs nimbly, and is nearly always engaged in searching for its food, which is wholly animal.
The birds include eagles - some are called lammervangers from their occasional attacks on young lambs - vultures, hawks, kites, owls, crows, ravens, the secretary bird, cranes, a small white heron, quails, partridges, korhaans, wild geese, duck, and guineafowl, swallows, finches, starlings, the mossie or Cape sparrow, and the widow bird, noted for the length of its tail in summer.
It is a study of social and ethnological conditions, and contains many passages of literary charm, describing bird life, animal life and natural scenery.
For no beast however mighty, no bird however graceful, was a fit companion for God's masterpiece, and, apart from the serpent, the animals had no faculty of speech.
It is a native of the Canary Islands and Madeira, where it occurs abundantly in the wild state, and is of a greyish-brown colour, slightly varied with brighter hues, although never attaining the beautiful plumage of the domestic bird.
During the years of its domestication, the canary has been the subject of careful artificial selection, the result being the production of a bird differing widely in the colour of its plumage, and in a lew of its varieties even in size and form, from the original wild species.
In a state of nature canaries pair, but under domestication the male bird has been rendered polygamous, being often put with four or five females; still he is said to show a distinct preference for the female with which he was first mated.
The work of building the nest, and of incubation, falls chiefly on the female, while the duty of feeding the young rests mainly with the cock bird.
The signs were usually obtained from the inspection of the liver (according to Johns, that of the lamb that was sacrificed); or it took place through birds; hence the name in this case given to the baru of dagil insure " bird inspector."
Unmolested by enemies (Harpagornis, a tremendous bird of prey, died out with the Pleistocene), living in an equable insular climate, with abundant vegetation, the moas flourished and seem to have reached their greatest development in specialization, numbers, and a bewildering variety of large and small kinds, within quite recent times.
He introduced several practical improvements, such as the measurement of time to tenths of a second; and he prevailed upon the government to replace Bird's mural quadrant by a repeating circle 6 ft.
It is said that no representation of any parrot appears in Egyptian art, nor does any reference to a bird of the kind occur in the Bible, whence it has been concluded that neither painters nor writers had any knowledge of it.
Aristotle is commonly supposed to be the first author who mentions a parrot; but this is an error, for nearly a century earlier Ctesias in his Indica (cap. 3),2 under the name of fib-Taws (Bittacus), so neatly described a bird which could speak an "Indian" language - naturally, as he seems to have thought - or Greek - if it had been taught so to do - about as big as a sparrow-hawk (Hierax), with a purple face and a black beard, otherwise blue-green (cyaneus) and vermilion in colour, so that there cannot be much risk in declaring that he must have had before him a male example of what is now commonly known as the Blossom-headed parakeet, and to ornithologists as Palaeornis cyanocephalus, an inhabitant of many parts of India.
An extremely interesting collection is maintained, the variety of bird life, both feral and in captivity, being notable.
One naturally infers from this that the "cherub" was sometimes viewed as a bird.
The bird, however, was probably a mythic, extra-natural bird.
The third, however, was made of the sound of a cat's footsteps, a man's beard, the roots of a mountain, a fish's breath and a bird's spittle.
Among indigenous fruit-bearing trees, shrubs and vines the state has the bird cherry, black cherry, blueberry, cranberry, raspberry, blackberry, gooseberry, strawberry, grape and black currant; and conspicuous among a very great variety of shrubs and flowering plants are the rose, dogwood, laurel, sumac, holly, winterberry, trilliums, anemones, arbutuses, violets, azaleas, eglantine, clematis, blue gentians, orange lilies, orchids, asters and golden rod.
Willughby in 1676 it was the name given by Yorkshiremen to the bird popularly known in England as the " Summer-Snipe," - the Tringa hypoleucos of Linnaeus and the Totanus hypoleucos of later writers, - but probably even in Willughby's time the name was of much wider signification.
To the latter belong the Greenshank and Redshank, as well as the Common Sandpiper, the " Summer-Snipe " above-mentioned, a bird hardly exceeding a skylark in size, and of very general distribution throughout the British Islands, but chiefly frequenting clear streams, especially those with a gravelly or rocky bottom, and mast generally breeding on the beds of sand or shingle on their banks.
This sandpiper is characterized by its dark upper plumage, which contrasts strongly with the white of the lower part of the back and gives the bird as it flies much the look of a very large house-martin.
It is an abundant bird in most parts of northern Europe, migrating in winter very far to the southward.
The bird-life of the country is remarkably rich; one bird of magnificent plumage, the quetzal, quijal or quesal (Trogon resplendens), has been chosen as the national emblem.
It is the home of the southern fox-squirrel, Cotton rat, ricefield rat, wood rat, free-tailed bat, mocking bird, painted bunting, prothonotary warbler, red-cockaded woodpecker, chuckwills-widow, and the swallow-tailed and Mississippi kites.
In certain parts of Ontario the wild turkey is occasionally found and the ordinary quail, but in British Columbia is found the California quail, and a larger bird much resembling it called the mountain partridge.
This bird, which ranges over the North Atlantic, is seldom seen on the European side below lat.
In the old times birds were protected by the native belief that divine messages were conveyed by bird cries, and by royal edict forbidding the killing of species furnishing the material for feather cloaks, contributions towards which were long almost the only taxes paid.
A bird called moho, but actually of a different family, was the Pennula ecaudata or millsi, which had hardly any tail, and had wings so degenerate that it was commonly thought wingless.
From this time the whole structure of the kiwi has certainly been far better known than that of nearly any other bird, and by degrees other examples found their way to England, some of which were distributed to the various museums of the Continent and of America.'
While hunting for its food the bird makes a continual sniffing sound through the nostrils, which are placed at the extremity of the upper mandible.
That the sense of touch is highly developed seems quite certain, because the bird, although it may not be audibly sniffing, will always first touch an object with the point of its bill, whether in the act of feeding or of surveying the ground; and when shut up in a cage or confined in a room it may be heard, all through the night, tapping softly at the walls..
It is amusing to observe the extreme care and deliberation with which the bird draws the worm from its hidingplace, coaxing it out as it were by degrees, instead of pulling roughly or breaking it.
Externally the most striking feature of the bird is its head, armed with a powerful beak that it well knows how to use, and its face clothed with hairs and elongated feathers that sufficiently resemble the physiognomy of an owl to justify the generic name bestowed upon it.
The aborted condition of this process can hardly be regarded but in connexion with the incapacity of the bird for flight, and may very likely be the result of disuse.
A magnetic observatory was equipped at Bogen Atlas range the food of this bird is said to consist chiefly of the Testudo mauritanica, which "it carries to some height in the air, and lets fall on a stone to break the shell" (Ibis, 18 59, p. 1 77).
It is a very plainlooking bird, black above and white beneath, and about the size of a pigeon.
All the bright-hued examples we now see in captivity have been induced by carefully breeding from any chance varieties that have shown themselves; and not only the colour, but the build and stature of the bird have in this manner been greatly modified.
This bird is still more beautifully coloured than the chaffinch - especially in summer, when, the brown edges of the feathers being shed, it presents a rich combination of black, white and orange.
But it is almost as unquestionable that the name was originally applied to the bird which we know as the guinea-fowl, and there is no doubt that some authors in the 16th and 17th centuries curiously confounded these two species.
Much labour has been given by various naturalists to ascertain the date of its introduction to Europe, to which we can at present only make an approximate attempt; 3 but after all that has been written it is plain that evidence concurs to show that the bird was established in Europe by 1530 - a very short time to have elapsed since it became known to the Spaniards, which could hardly have been before 1518, when Mexico was discovered.
In 1555 both sexes were characteristically figured by Belon (Oyseaux, p. 249), as was the cock by Gesner in the same year, and these are the earliest representations of the bird known to exist.
This has been much crossed with the American Bronze, the largest of all, which has the beautiful metallic plumage of the wild bird, with the 1 The French Coq and Poule d'Inde (whence Dindon) involve no contradiction, looking to the general idea of what India then was.
The bird was evidently plentiful down to the very seaboard of.
If this supposition be true, there would be reason to believe in the double introduction of the bird into England at least, as already hinted, but positive information is almost wholly wanting.'
Those who only know the Snipe as it shows itself in the shooting-season, when without warning it rises from the boggy ground uttering a sharp note that sounds like scape, scape, and, after a few rapid twists, darts away, if it be not brought down by the gun, to disappear in the distance after a desultory flight, have no conception of the bird's behaviour at breeding-time.
A few seconds after each of these headlong descents a mysterious sound strikes his ear - compared by some to drumming, and by others to the bleating of a sheep or goat,' which sound evidently comes from the bird as it shoots downwards, and then only.
A similar sound may be made by affixing those feathers to the end of a rod and drawing them rapidly downwards in the same position as they occupy in the bird's tail while it is performing the feat.
Thus the bill becomes a most delicate organ of sensation, and by its means the bird, while probing for food, is at once able to distinguish the nature of the objects it encounters, though these are wholly out of sight.
Sometimes the soul is conceived as a bird.
The Bella Coola Indians say the soul is a bird enclosed in an egg and lives in the nape of the neck.
If however the bird flies away, egg and all, then he faints or loses his reason.
A popular superstition in Bohemia assumes that the soul in the shape of a white bird leaves the body by way of the mouth.
Other versions of the Death-myth in Polynesia relate that Maui stole a march on Night as she slept, and would have passed right through her to destroy her, but a little bird which sings at sunset woke her, she destroyed Maui, and men lost immortality.
The old fable of this bird inserting its beak into a reed or plunging it into the ground, and so causing the booming sound with which its name will be always associated, is also exploded, and nowadays indeed so few people in Britain have ever heard its loud and awful voice, which seems to be uttered only in the breeding-season, and is therefore unknown in a country where it no longer breeds, that incredulity as to its booming at all has in some quarters succeeded the old belief in this as in other reputed peculiarites of the species.
Some cuckoos are singular for their habit of using the nests of smaller birds to lay their eggs in, so that the young may be reared by foster-parents; and it has been suggested that the object of the likeness exhibited to the hawk is to enable the cock cuckoo either to frighten the small birds away from their nests or to lure them in pursuit of him, while the hen bird quietly and without molestation disposes of her egg.
The fact that both sexes of the cuckoo resemble the hawk does not necessarily prove this suggested explanation to be false; but if it be true that the smaller passerine birds are duped by the similarity to the bird of prey, it may be that the cuckoos themselves escape molestation from larger hawks on account of their resemblance to the sparrowhawk.
The drongo is a fierce and powerful bird which will not tolerate a strange bird of the size of a cuckoo near its nest, yet on account of its resemblance to the drongo, the hen cuckoo is enabled, it has been claimed, to lay her egg in the nest of the drongo, which mistakes the cuckoo for one of its own kind.
The Tylas has departed from the normal coloration of its group to take on that of the shrike, a comparatively powerful and pugnacious bird.
The mooruk, or Bennett's cassowary (Casuarius Bennettii), is a shorter and more robust bird, approaching in the thickness of its legs to the moas.
The adult bird in the wild state is exceedingly shy and difficult of approach, and, owing to its great fleetness and strength, is rarely if ever caught.
James Bruce identified this bird with the Abu-Hannes or "Father John" of the Abyssinians, and in 1790 it received from Latham (Index ornithologicus, p. 706) the name of Tantalus aethiopicus.
The ibis is somewhat larger than a curlew, Numenius arquata, which bird it resembles, with a much stouter bill and stouter legs.
This bird, believed to be the second kind of ibis spoken of by Herodotus, is rather smaller than the sacred ibis, and mostly of a dark chestnut colour with brilliant green and purple reflections on the upper parts, exhibiting, however, when young none of the rufous hue.
The bird is easily kept in captivity, and no doubt from early times many were brought alive to Europe.
Buffon accounted a grave defect of nature, and it must be confessed that no one has given what seems to be a satisfactory explanation of its precise use, though on evolutionary principles none will now doubt its fitness to the bird's requirements.
The tail is capable of free vertical motion, and controlled by strong muscles, so that, at least in the true toucans, when the bird is preparing to sleep it is reverted and lies almost flat on the back, on which also the huge bill reposes, pointing in the opposite direction.
Sloes and bird cherries should be removed from the neighbourhood of plum-trees, as the various disease-producing insects and fungi live also on these species.
Notwithstanding the war carried on against the jay, its varied cries and active gesticulations show it to be a sprightly bird, and at a distance that renders its beauty-spots invisible, it is yet rendered conspicuous by its cinnamon-coloured body and pure white tail-coverts, which contrast with the deep black and rich chestnut that otherwise mark its plumage, and even the young at once assume a dress closely resembling that of the adult.
Its versatile cries and actions, as seen and heard by those who penetrate the solitude of the northern forests it inhabits, can never be forgotten by one who has had experience of them, any more than the pleasing sight of its rust-coloured tail, which an occasional gleam of sunshine will light up into a brilliancy quite unexpected by those who have only surveyed the bird's otherwise gloomy appearance in the glass-case of a museum.
In fact, no one can listen to the cheery sound of the little bird's ordinary calls with anything but a hopeful feeling.
In this bird and its many allied forms, coloration, though almost confined to various tints of blue, seems to reach its climax, but want of space forbids more particular notice of them, or of the members of the other genera Cyanocitta, Cyanocorax, Xanthura, Psilorhinus, and more, which inhabit various parts of the Western continent.
One of the most singular of furbearing animals, being the link between bird and beast.
As such he survives in the Charos or Charontas of the modern Greeks - a black bird which darts down upon its prey, or a winged horseman who fastens his victims to the saddle and bears them away to the realms of the dead.
When the leaf hangs down it resembles the foot of a bird, and hence the name.
On the other hand L'Herminier in 1827 saw features in the Tinamou's sternum that in his judgment linked the bird to the Rallidae.
The wings are short and rounded, and in some forms the feathers ' Brisson and after him Linnaeus confounded this bird, which they had never seen, with the Trumpeter.
The whole length of the bird is from 43 to 46 in., of which, however, about 20 are due to the long cuneiform tail, while the pointed wings measure more than 30 in.
A tuft of black, bristly feathers projects beardlike from the base of the mandible, and gives the bird one of its commonest epithets in many languages.
There is much discrepancy as to the ordinary food of the lammergeyer, some observers maintaining that it lives almost entirely on carrion, offal and even ordure; but there is no question of its frequently taking living prey, and it is reasonable to suppose that this bird, like so many others, is not everywhere uniform in its habits.
In habits it resembles the northern bird, from which it differs in little more than wanting the black stripe below the eye and having the lower part of the tarsus bare of feathers.
This bird was long thought to be the Sitta europaea of Linnaeus; but that is now admitted to be the northern form, with the lower parts white, and its buff-breasted representative in central, southern and western Europe, including England, is known as Sitta caesia.
The word "animal" in the act includes bird, beast, fish or reptile.
The acts establish a close time for wild birds and impose penalties for shooting or taking them within that time; prohibit the exposing or offering for sale within certain dates any wild bird recently killed or taken unless bought or received from some person residing out of the United Kingdom; the taking or destroying of wild birds' eggs, the setting of pole traps, and the taking of a wild bird by means of a hook or other similar instrument.
The cuckoo was also sacred to Hera, who, according to the Argive legend, was wooed by Zeus in the form of the bird.
Being a very watchful bird, its cry of warning, when it flies off on the approach of danger, is probably appreciated by the crocodile.
Some 300 species of birds are found in Egypt, and one of the most striking features of a journey up the Nile is the abundance of bird life.
The spurwing is supposed to be the bird mentioned by Herodotus as eating the parasites covering the inside of the mouth of the crocodile.
Of game-birds the most plentiful are sandgrouse, quail (a bird of passage) and snipe.
It is a curious fact that not a single bird is visible on the fragments, and the trees and plants, which might easily have been collected in a tillage compact and well-defined section, are widely scattered.
In the frog, lizard, and even bird, it is thin and poorly developed.
In the second case the outer series (calyx of sepals) is generally green and leaf-like, its function being to protect the rest of the flower, especially in the bud; while the inner series (corolla of petals) is generally white or brightly coloured, and more delicate in structure, its function being to attract the particular insect or bird by agency of which pollination is effected.
On his assurances the lords, expecting an amnesty, withdrew their guards from the palace and next day found that the bird had flown to the strong castle of Dunbar.
He rode about Epping Forest, sometimes in a toy suit of armour, became a close observer of animal nature, and was able to recognize any bird upon the wing.
Its notes are marvellous imitations of " the most mellow, sweet-sounding flute," but the singer itself, according to Mr Simson, is " a very insignificant-looking little, greyish-coloured bird," which " always dies in captivity."
Whilst feeding, the bird wades about, stirs up the mud with its feet, and, reversing the ordinary position of its head so as to hold the crown downwards and to look backwards, sifts the mud through its bill.
Then the bird erects its long neck to swallow the selected food.
Of course the hen sits with her legs doubled up under her, as does any other long-legged bird.
Archaeopteryx was a bird, without any doubt, but still with so many low, essentially reptilian characters that it forms a link between these two classes.
Huxley, "Remarks on the Skeleton of the Archaeopteryx and on the relations of the bird to the reptile," Geol.
Thoth is found on the earliest monuments symbolized by an ibis (Ibis aethio pica, still not uncommon in Nubia), which bird was sacred to him.
The Afghan is by breed and nature a bird of prey.
The resemblance between the jerboa's and the bird's skeleton is owing to adaptation to a similar mode of existence.
It is an exceedingly scarce bird, and beyond its having an Arctic habitat, little has yet been ascertained about it.
Lumber the writing with nothing - let it go as lightly as the bird flies in the air or a fish swims in the sea.
The California vulture, the largest flying bird in North America and fully as large as the Andean condor, is not limited to California but is fairly common there.
At first sight this singular structure appears so like a deformity that writers have not been wanting to account it such, 2 ignorant of its being a piece of mechanism most beautifully adapted to the habits of the bird, enabling it to extract with the greatest ease, from fir-cones or fleshy fruits, the seeds which form its usual and almost invariable food.
The articulation of the mandible to the quadrate-bone is such as to allow of a very considerable amount of lateral play, and, by a particular arrangement of the muscles which move the former, it comes to pass that so soon as the bird opens its mouth the point of the mandible is brought immediately opposite to that of the maxilla (which itself is movable vertically), instead of crossing or overlapping it - the usual position when the mouth is closed.
A medieval legend ascribes the conformation of bill and coloration of plumage to a divine recognition of the bird's pity, bestowed on Christ at the crucifixion.
Three other forms of the genus also inhabit the Old World - two of them so closely resembling the common bird that their specific validity has been often questioned.
It does not seem to have been commonly known till the middle of the 16th century, when John Caius sent a description and figure, with the name Gallus Mauritanus, to Gesner, who published both in his Paralipomena in 1555, and in the same year Belon also gave a notice and woodcut under the name of Poulle de la Guinee; but while the former authors properly referred their bird to the ancient Meleagris, the latter confounded the Meleagris and the turkey.
This bird has been introduced to Rodriguez, where it is now found wild.
This bird, apparently mentioned by Marcgrave more than 200 years ago, but first described by Pallas, is remarkable for the structure - unique, if not possessed by its representative forms - of its furcula, where the head, instead of being .the thin plate found in all other Gallinae, is a hollow cup opening upwards, into which the trachea dips, and then emerges on its way to the lungs.
Haunting buildings and famous ruins, gliding around pools, walls and trees, mysteriously disappearing below ground, the serpent and all its kind invariably arrested attention through its uncanny distinctiveness from bird or beast.
On his way home he saw the great bird Rukh (evidently, from his description, an island lifted by refraction); revisited Sumatra, Malabar, Oman, Persia, Bagdad, and crossed the great desert to Palmyra and Damascus, where he got his first news of home, and heard of his father's death fifteen years before.
The ruffed grouse and wild turkey are found in the wooded mountainous districts, while the quail (here called "partridge") is a game bird of the open stubble fields.
Swift of flight, powerfully armed, but above all endowed with extraordinary courage, they pursue their weaker cousins, making the latter disgorge their already swallowed prey, which is nimbly caught before it reaches the water; and this habit, often observed by sailors and fishermen, has made these predatory, and parasitic birds locally known as "Teasers," "Boatswains," 2 and, from a misconception of their 1 Thus written by Hoier (circa 1604) as that of a Faeroese bird (hodie Skuir) an example of which he sent to Clusius (Exotic. Auctarium, p. 367).
On land, however, whither they resort to breed, they seek food of their own taking, whether small mammals, little birds, insects or berries; but even here their uncommon courage is exhibited, and they will defend their homes and offspring with the utmost spirit against any intruder, repeatedly shooting down on man or dog that invades their haunts, while every bird almost, from an eagle downwards, is repelled by buffets or something worse.
The largest species known is the Stercorarius catarrhactes of ornithologists - the "Skooi" or "Bonxie" of the Shetlanders, a bird in size equalling a herring-gull, Larus argentatus.
The smallest species, commonly known in English as the long-tailed or Buffon's generally likened to the marlinespike that is identified with the boatswain's position; but perhaps the authoritative character assumed by both bird and officer originally suggested the name.
Yet for all this it would long ago have been extirpated there, and have ceased to be a British bird in all but name, but for the special protection afforded it by several members of two families (Edmonston and Scott of Melby), long before it was protected by modern legislation.
The soul of the bird, he explains, enters them with its flesh, and endows them with power of divination.
To this date belong Millet's "Golden Age," "Bird Nesters," "Young Girl and Lamb," and "Bathers"; but to the "Bathers" (Louvre) succeeded "The Mother Asking Alms," "The Workman's Monday," and "The Winnower."
The animals, domesticated or wild, like the horse or cow, the guardian dog, the bird of omen, naturally share the same life, and are approached with the same invocation.
The elastic impalpable stuff of the spirit-body is apparently capable of compression or expansion, just as Athena can transform herself into a bird.
The canary bird is domesticated but not acclimatized, and many of our most extensively cultivated plants are in the same category.
The latter, however, though thriving as an aviary bird, has failed at large in England, as did the bob-white (Onyx virginianus) both there and in New Zealand.
The desirable character of the grouse as game-birds has led to many attempts at their acclimatization, but usually these have been unsuccessful; the red grouse (Lagopus scoticus), however, the only endemic British bird, is naturalized in some parts of Europe.
The allied tree-sparrow (P. montanus) has been locally naturalized in the United States; it is a more desirable bird, being less prolific and pugnacious, but it is expelled from towns by the house-sparrow.
The so-called Java sparrow (Munia oryzivora), although a destructive bird to rice, has been widely distributed by accident or design, and is now found in several East Indian islands besides Java, in south China, St Helena, India, Zanzibar and the east African coast.
The little rooibek of South Africa (Estrilda astrild) has been so long and well established in St Helena that it is known in the bird trade as the St Helena waxbill, and the brilliant scarlet weaver of Madagascar (Foudia madagascariensis) inhabits as an imported bird Mauritius, the Seychelles and even the remote Chagos Islands.
I perceive a young bird in that bush!
He was the author of several works on ornithology, and presented his collections of bird skins and eggs to the British Museum.
Seal Island and Penguin Island are in the bay; Ichaboe, Mercury, and Hollam's Bird islands are to the north; Halifax, Long, Possession, Albatross, Pomona, Plumpudding, and Roastbeef islands are to the south.
These are P. megapodius, called El Turco by the natives, which is noticeable for its ungainly appearance and awkward gait; the P. albicollis, which inhabits barren hillsides and is called tapacollo from the manner of carrying its tail turned far forward over its back; the P. rubecula, of Chiloe, a small timid denizen of the gloomy forest, called the cheucau or chuca, whose two or three notes are believed by the superstitious natives to be auguries of impending success or disaster; and an allied species (Hylactes Tarnii, King) called the guid-guid or barking bird, whose cry is a close imitation of the yelp of a small dog.
I saw neither bird, quadruped, reptile, nor insect."
In South America another large Ratite bird, the rhea, is called ostrich; it can be distinguished at once from the true ostrich by its possession of three toes.
Andersson in his Lake N'gami (pp. 2 5326 9) has given a lively account of the pursuit by himself and Francis Galton of a brood of ostriches, in the course of which the male bird feigned being wounded to distract their attention from his offspring.
The interior of Novaya Zemlya shows hardly a trace of animal life, save here and there a vagrant bird, a few lemmings, an ice-fox, a brown or white bear, and at times immigrant reindeer.
Towards evening it arouses itself, and, with croaking and 1 Not to be confounded with the bird so called in the French Antilles, which is a petrel (Oestrelata).
On ladies' seals the owner is often gracefully depicted standing and holding flower or bird, or with shields of arms. After the 14th century, the figures of ladies, other than queens, vanish from seals.
This bird inhabits the lagoons and swamps of Paraguay and Southern Brazil, where it is called " Chaja " or " Chaka," and is smaller than the preceding, wanting its " horn," but having its head furnished with a dependent crest of feathers; while the plumage is grey.
A most singular habit possessed by this bird is that of rising in the air and soaring there in circles at an immense altitude, uttering at intervals the very loud cry of which its local name is an imitation.
Another very curious property of this bird, which was observed by Jacquin, who brought it to the notice of Linnaeus, 2 is its emphysematous condition - there being a layer of air-cells between the skin and the muscles, so that on any part of the body being pressed a crackling sound is heard.
In the Bornean cult of the hawk it seems that the divine bird itself was regarded as having a foreknowledge of the future.
The purple cloak which Picus wore fastened by a golden clasp is preserved in the plumage of the bird.
In the simplest form of art, he was represented by a wooden pillar surmounted by a woodpecker; later, as a young man with the bird upon his head.
A bird when swimming extends its feet simultaneously or alternately in a backward direction, and so obtains a forward recoil.
The water supports the bird, and the feet simply propel.
When the bird dives, or flies under water, the long axis of the body is inclined obliquely downwards and forwards, and the bird forces itself into and beneath the water by the action of its feet, or wings, or both.
These changes in the direction of the long axis of the bird in swimming, diving and flying, and in the direction of the stroke of the wings in sub-aquatic and aerial flight, are due to the fact that the bird is heavier than the air and lighter than the water.
It has been asserted, and with some degree of plausibility, that a fish might swim, and that a bird lighter it ought, however, to be borne in mind FIG.
Weight and power are always associated in living animals, and the fact that living animals are made heavier than the medium they are to navigate may be regarded as a conclusive argument in favour of weight being necessary alike to the swimming of the fish and the flying of the bird.
It is necessary, therefore, at this stage to direct the attention of the reader somewhat fully to the subject of flight, as witnessed in the insect, bird and bat, a knowledge of natural flight preceding, and being in some sense indispensable to, a knowledge of artificial flight.
This physiologist in 1867 2 showed that all natural wings, whether of the insect, bird or bat, are screws structurally, and that they act as screws when the y are made to vibrate, from the fact that they twist in opposite directions during the down and up strokes.
The wing in the insect is more flattened than in the bird; and advantage is taken on some occasions of this circumstance, particularly in heavy-bodied, small-winged, quick-flying insects, to reverse the pinion more or less completely during the down and up strokes."
The wing of the bird, like that of the insect, is concavo-convex, and more or less twisted upon itself when extended, so that the anterior or thick margin of the pinion presents a different degree of curvature to that of the posterior or thin margin.
That this shape is intimately associated with flight is apparent from the fact that the rowing feathers of the wing of the bird are every one of them distinctly spiral in their nature; in fact, one entire rowing feather is equivalent - morphologically and physiologically - to one entire insect wing.
The wing is really eccentric in its nature, a remark which applies also to the rowing feathers of the bird's wing.
The compound rotation of the wing, as seen in the bird, is represented in fig.
To meet these peculiarities the insect, bird and bat are furnished with extensive flying surfaces in the shape of wings, which they apply with singular velocity and power to the air, as levers of the third order.
If a bird attempts to fly in a calm, the wings must be made to smite the air after the manner of.
In this case the wings fly the bird.
If, however, the bird is fairly launched in space and a stiff breeze is blowing, all that is required in many instances is to extend the wings at a slight upward angle to the horizon so that the under parts of the wings present kite-like surfaces.
In these circumstances the rapidly moving air flies the bird.
If by any chance this magnificent bird alights upon the sea he must flap and beat the water and air with his wings with tremendous energy until he gets fairly launched.
The area of the insect, bird and bat, when the wings are fully expanded, is greater than that of any other class of animal, their weight being proportionally less.
As already stated, however, it ought never to be forgotten that even the lightest insect, bird or bat is vastly heavier than the air, and that no fixed relation exists between the weight of body and expanse of wing in any of the orders.
The alternate rise and fall of the body and wing of the bird are well seen when contemplating the flight of the gull e ?
A bird when flying is a body in motion; but a body in motion tends to fall not vertically downwards, but downwards and forwards.
The wings consequently must be made to strike forwards and kept in advance of the body of the bird if they are to prevent the bird from falling downwards and forwards.
If the wings were to strike backwards in aerial flight, the bird would turn a forward somersault.
If any one watches a bird rising from the ground or the water, he cannot fail to perceive that the head and body are slightly tilted upwards, and that the wings are made to descend with great vigour in a downward and forward direction.
No one ever saw a bird in the air flapping its wings towards its tail.
The old idea was that the wings during the down stroke pushed the body of the bird in an upward and forward direction; in reality the wings do not push but pull, and in order to pull they must always be in advance of the body to be flown.
If the wings did not themselves fly forward, they could not possibly cause the body of the bird to fly forward.
It is the wings which cause the bird to fly.
This author, distinguished alike as a physiologist, mathematician and mechanician, describes and figures a bird with artificial wings, each of which consists of a rigid rod in front and flexible feathers behind.
He, in fact, endeavours to prove that a bird wedges itself forward upon the air by the perpendicular vibration of its wings, the wings during their action forming a wedge, the base of which (c b e) is directed towards the head of the bird, the apex (a f) being directed towards the tail (d).
In the 1 96th proposition of his work (De motu animalium, Leiden, 1685) he states that " If the expanded wings of a bird suspended in the air shall strike the undisturbed air beneath it with a motion perpendicular to the horizon, the bird will fly with a transverse motion in a plane parallel with the horizon."
Whether, therefore, the air strikes the wings from below, or the wings strike the air from above, the result is the same, - the posterior or flexible margins of the wings yield in an upward direction, and in so doing urge the bird in a horizontal direction."
If any one watches the horizontal or upward flight of a large bird he will observe that the posterior or flexible margin of the wing never rises during the down stroke to a perceptible extent, so that the under surface of the wing, as a whole, never looks backwards.
De Villeneuve and Penaud constructed their winged models on different types, the former selecting the bat, the latter the bird.
India-rubber springs were made to extend between the inner posterior parts of the wings and the frame, corresponding to the backbone of the bird.
In Penaud's artificial bird the equilibrium is secured by the addition of a tail.
This frame extends on either side of the car in a similar manner to the outstretched wings of a bird; but with this difference, that the frame is immovable.
To an axis at the stern of the car a triangular frame is attached, resembling the tail of a bird, which is also covered with canvas or oiled silk.
This reproduced the structure of a bird with almost servile imitation, save that traction was obtained by two screw-propellers.
Bird and insect life is abundant.
Herons, hawks, terns, Egyptian geese, fishing eagles (Gypohierax), the weaver and the whydah bird are found in the lower and middle Congo.
They have told us how he never shot at a bird perching nor fished with a net, the creatures not having in such a case a fair chance for their lives; how he conducted himself in court and among villagers; how he ate his food, and lay in his bed, and sat in his carriage; how he rose up before the old man and the mourner; how he changed countenance when it thundered, and when he saw a grand display of viands at a feast.
With this comes the whole vast and ever-widening range of inventive and adaptive art, where the uniform hereditary instinct of the cell-forming bee and the nest-building bird is supplanted by multiform processes and constructions, often at first rude and clumsy in comparison to those of the lower instinct, but carried on by the faculty of improvement and new invention into ever higher stages.
The most easterly island is Frigate, the most southerly Platte; on the northern edge of the reef are Bird and Denis islands.
Except Bird and Denis islands, which are of coralline limestone, the Seychelles are of granite, with in places fringing reefs of coral based on granite foundations.
In bird and insect life Colombia is second only to Brazil.
The greater number of birds belong to the order Passeres; starlings, weavers and larks are very common, the Cape canary, long-tailed sugar bird, pipits and wagtails are fairly numerous.
The English starling is stated to be the only European bird to have thoroughly established itself in the colony.
The Upupa ceylonensis is familiar to the natives as the "bird of the Li matrons," and the Palaeornis javanica as the "sugar-cane bird."
He had meantime (in 1742) been appointed to succeed Edmund Halley as astronomer royal; his enhanced reputation enabled him to apply successfully for an instrumental outfit at a cost of 1000; and with an 8-foot quadrant completed for him in 1750 by John Bird (1709-1776), he accumulated at Greenwich in ten years materials of inestimable value for the reform of astronomy.
It seems impossible not to connect the latter with the Scottish Atteile or Atteal, to be found in many old records, though this last word (however it be spelt) is generally used in conjunction with teal, as if to mean a different kind of bird; and commentators have shown a marvellous ineptitude in surmising what that bird was.
In ordinary talk "Teal" seems to stand for any Ducklike bird of small size, and in that sense the word is often applied to the members of the genus Nettopus, though some systematists will have it that they are properly Geese.
The colour of the bird is white, the back being streaked transversely with black or brown bands, and the wings dark.
Sailors capture the bird for its long wing-bones, which they manufacture into tobacco-pipe stems. The albatross lays one egg; it is white, with a few spots, and is about 4 in.
In breeding-time the bird resorts to solitary island groups, like the Crozet Islands and the elevated Tristan da Cunha, where it has its nest - a natural hollow or a circle of earth roughly scraped together - on the open ground.
The early explorers of the great Southern Sea cheered themselves with the companionship of the albatross in its dreary solitudes; and the evil hap of him who shot with his cross-bow the bird of good omen is familiar to readers of Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner.
The song birds and insectivorous birds include the cardinal grosbeak, scarlet and summer tanagers, meadow lark, song sparrow, catbird, brown thrasher, wood thrush, house wren, robin, blue bird, goldfinch, red-headed woodpecker, flicker (golden-winged woodpecker), and several species of warblers.
This bird is a winter visitor to Britain, and its Arctic nesting-places being then unknown, it was fabled to originate within the shell-like fruit of a tree growing by the sea-shore.
The more characteristic and useful birds include many species of the sparrow, such as the song, swamp, Lincoln's chipping and field sparrow; the bank, barn, cliff, white-bellied and rough-winged swallow, as well as the purple martin and the chimney swift; ten or more species of fly-catchers, including the least, arcadian, phoebe, wood pewee, olive-sided and king bird; about ten species of woodpeckers, of which the more common are the downy, hairy, yellowbellied and golden-winged (flicker); about thirty species of warblers, including the parula, cerulean, Blackburnian, prothonotary, yellow Nashville, red-start, worm-eating and chestnut-sided; and four or five species of vireos.
The song-birds are well represented in the hermit thrush, wood thrush, Wilson's thrush (or veery), brown thrasher, robin, blue bird, bobolink, meadow lark, gold finch, &c. Among the game birds are the ruffed grouse (partridge), quail, prairie hen and wild turkey.
Friction between the settlers and the Indians could not long be avoided, and in 1827 Red Bird and his band of Winnebago attacked the whites, but after some bloodshed they were defeated by Major William Whistler (1780-1863) of Fort Howard.
The change, in spite of the misnomer - for, whatever may be the case elsewhere, in England the bird does not feed upon oysters - met with general approval, and the new name has, at least in books, almost wholly replaced what seems to have been the older one.'
Harting informed the present writer that the bird seems to lay its head sideways on the ground, and then, grasping the limpet's shell close to the rock between the mandibles, use them as scissor-blades to cut off the mollusc from its sticking-place.