Page:Natural History, Birds.djvu/236

 (Poultry.)

Of all the Orders of birds there is none which is so valuable to man as this; their flesh is tender, sapid, and digestible, and their eggs are in high esteem as human aliment, while from their generally large size, the number of the eggs which they lay, and consequently their rapid increase, the power which they exhibit of accommodating themselves to the vicissitudes of climate, and the facility with which they are domesticated, they may be considered as supplying the place of the Ruminants among Mammalia.

The characters by which they are distinguished are strong and well-defined. They are all granivorous, feeding on the farinaceous grains, pulse, and seeds, which are cultivated by man for his own sustenance, or upon their wild representatives; though insects are often added to this diet. Their heavy carriage, stout form, small head, and short, rounded, and hollow wings, at once distinguish them from other birds, while their soft and slight breast-bone (sternum), so cut away that the horizontal portion is reduced to two narrow strips on each side, its keel obliquely hollowed away in front, and the merrythought-bone (furcula) attached to it only by a ligament, are equally distinctive peculiarities in their internal anatomy. And these peculiarities exercise an important