The Comic Natural History of the Human Race (1851)

While many creatures in this comic bestiary represent specific people, others appear to satirize broader nineteenth-century types. The authors claim that Audubon, for instance, overlooked the Jail Bird, a trickster that is “often taken by hand to be confined in a cage, under the vain hope that it may learn to change its tune”. In the wild, the bird can be found near a fence with shiny things in its beak. Jail Birds are often caught by the Stool Pigeon, who is “a spy of the police”, eavesdropping at “ins and outs, ups and downs, churchs, court houses, play houses, poor houses, jail houses, hot houses, beer houses, hose houses, &c. &c.”