SAILS OR FINS ?
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR] SIR,—On November 20th, 1926, you were good enough to publish my assertion that birds and insects on the wing are physically unconscious of wind pressure, even though the wind is of gale force. They are, in fact, pure parasites. On September 7th, 1929, my recent book, This Bondage, which is based upon the postulate you kindly published, was reviewed at considerable length, and most generously, in your columns, and this book constitutes a direct challenge to that scientific orthodoxy which teaches that birds and insects do feel the wind. Biologists, in short, maintain that wings are sails, whereas I maintain that they are oars—fins. Here, Sir, is a direct and simple issue. If I am wrong, my fallacy should be exposed, for it is rapidly establishing itself in lay circles. If, on the other hand, I am correct, science must set about putting its ornithological house in order for reasons that This Bondage makes abundantly plain. • Will not some authoritative physicist who is a reader of the Spectator judge between myself and the biologists ?—I am,
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