Page:The Common Birds of Bombay.djvu/23

Rh male which is most beautifully, or at least most brilliantly, dressed; as is fit, for he is in the front ranks, fighting and making love, while her place is in the sweet backgrounds of life, and quietness and modesty adorn her best. Why civilised man has proceeded upon exactly the opposite principle is a question for philosophers. The male bird is generally the larger and stronger, but this rule is reversed among the birds of prey: the mothers of eagles need to be Amazons.

I wish to avoid everything technical as far as I can, but some sort of classification is necessary. And I have decided to follow that adopted by Jerdon. It is said to be unscientific and out of date, and doubtless it is; but it is familiar (which is the main thing) and all our bird literature was founded on it until lately. Even now, though The Fauna of British India must displace all previous publications as the standard text-book of naturalists in India, Jerdon is not superseded. His three volumes contain an account of Indian birds and their ways which has no rival yet. Besides this, I must confess that I consider Cuvier's classification (which Jerdon adopted with slight modifications) is practically more helpful than any of the tentative systems which are now competing for its place. He based his arrangement almost entirely upon the form of the beak and feet, which are the instruments by which a bird makes its living. This is a simple and a sound principle, which we put in practice when we recognise a Hindoo barber by the case of instruments which he wears on his stomach, and a coolie by his basket. In an Appendix will be found some brief directions for the application of this