Volume 1

The feathered tribes of the British Islands / By Robert Mudie.

  • Mudie, Robert, 1777-1842.
Date:
1841
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The feathered tribes of the British Islands / By Robert Mudie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    birds as the falcons, or insects as the swallows, have their wings of this construction. The pigeons, which are also birds of excellent wing, have the second feather longest; but the lapwing, which is remarkable for the variety of its motions in the air, has the longest feather farther into the wing. 7. The secondaries, or second quills of the wings. They arise from that part of the wing which is commonly called the second bone, and which answers to the fore arm in man. They arise from it toward the wrist joint, and admit of a folding of the wing between them and the primaries when the wing is closed. When the wing is open, they sometimes appear a continuation of the same curve with the primaries, and at other times they form a distinct curve of their own. 8. The tertiaries, or third quills of the wings. They arise chiefly from the same bones as the secondaries, but nearer to the elbow joint. In some birds, especially those which are in the habit of running very swiftly with the wings partially opened, the tertiaries are often so long and come so to a point, that the bird appears as if it had four wings, or rather had a double wing on each side. This form of wing answers some important purposes in their economy, which can be more satisfactorily noticed in the particular accounts of those birds in which it is found. From the manner in which the several coverts support each other and the quills, the wing is a finer combination of light¬ ness, strength, elasticity, and stifihess, than could be produced by any other means. The different coverts support each other, and admit of motion upon each other, not unlike that which takes place in a coach spring, which is about the best of our mechanical contrivances for rendering motion smooth and free from jolts, at the same time that the compound spring is much less liable to be broken than if it were formed of a single piece, containing the same quantity of metal. 9. The rum]) feathers and upper tail coverts. The first of these are a continuation of the covering of the baek ; and the second support the tail feathers on the upper side, and are strong in proportion as these are adapted for action in flying.