82. In talking of parrots, for instance, it is only a small part of the
creature's nature which is told by its scientific name of 'Scansor,' or
'Climber.' That it only clutches with its claws, and does not snatch or
strike with them;--that it helps itself about with its beak, on
branches, or bars of cage, in an absurd manner, as if partly imagining
itself hung up in a larder, are by no means the most vital matters
about the bird. Whereas, that its beak is always extremely short, and
is bent down so roundly that the angriest parrot cannot peck, but only
_bite_, if you give it a chance; that it _can_ bite, pinch, or
otherwise apply the mechanism of a pair of nut-crackers from the back
of its head, with effect; that it has a little black tongue capable of
much talk; above all, that it is mostly gay in plumage, often to
vulgarity, and always to pertness;--all these characters should surely
be represented to the apprehensive juvenile mind, in sum; and not
merely the bird's climbing qualities.

83. Again, that the race of birds called in Latin 'Rasores' _do_, in
the search for their food, usually scratch, and kick out their legs
behind, living for the most part in gravelly or littery places, of
which the hidden treasures are only to be discovered in that manner,
seems to me no supremely interesting custom of the animal's life, but
only a _manner_ of its household, or threshold, economy. But that the
tribe, on the whole, is unambitiously domestic, and never predatory;
that they fly little and low, eat much of what they can pick up without
trouble--and are _themselves_ always excellent eating;--yet so
exemplary in their own domestic cares and courtesies that one is
ashamed to eat them except in eggs;--that their plumage is for the most
part warm brown, delicately and even bewitchingly spotty;--and that, in
the goodliest species, the spots become variegated, and inlaid as in a
Byzantine pavement, deepening to imperial purple and azure, and
lightening into luster of innumerable eyes;--all this, I hold, very
clearly and positively, should be explained to children as a part of
science, quite as exact, and infinitely more gracious, than that which
reckons up the whole tribe of loving and luminous creatures under the
feebly descriptive term of 'Scratchers.'

I will venture therefore to recommend my younger readers, in classing
birds, to think of them literally from top to toe--from toe to top I
should say,--foot, body, and head,