Thrush-tit
[[253]]
CHAPTER XXXIII
GRANIVOROUS BIRDS
“It might at first seem that I ought to be as lenient toward those who hunt granivorous birds as I have just shown myself severe toward the destroyers of insectivorous birds; for can it be denied that birds given to a vegetable diet are harmful to our crops, that they plunder our grain-fields and devour great quantities of seeds, buds, fruit, and young garden plants? Some of them know how to extract the wheat grains from the ear, and others boldly come to get their share of the oats thrown to the poultry in our barnyards. Others, again, prefer the juicy flesh of fruit and know before we do when cherries are ripe or pears are mellow, so that when we come to gather in the harvest all that we find is merely what they have left. There are even some that have a queer-shaped beak for splitting fruit open and dividing it into quarters so as to get at the pips, which are to them the very choicest of titbits. Look at this one’s beak and tell me if you have ever seen a more singular tool.”
“The two mandibles cross each other,” said Jules. “Instead of meeting they go criss-cross like the blades of an old pair of scissors out of order.”
“What can such a rickety beak be good for,” [[254]]Emile asked, “with its tips pointing one up and the other down? It will never be able to pick up a seed from the ground.”
“Consequently, it does not get its food from the ground. Its manner of proceeding is more complicated.