_From the Forest and Stream._
The advocates of protection for our small birds present two sets of
reasons for preventing their killing; the one sentimental, and the
other economic.
The sentimental reasons are the ones most often urged; they are also
of a kind to appeal with especial force to those whose responsibility
for the destruction of the birds is greatest. The women and girls, for
whose adornment birds' plumage is chiefly used, think little and know
less about the services which birds perform for agriculture, and
indeed it may be doubted whether the sight of a bunch of feathers or a
stuffed bird's skin suggests to them any thought of the life that
those feathers once represented. But when the wearers are reminded
that there was such a life; that it was cheery and beautiful, and that
it was cut short merely that their apparel might be adorned, they are
quick to recognize that bird destruction involves a wrong, and are
ready to do their part toward ending it by refusing to wear plumage.
The small boy who pursues little birds from the standpoint of the
hunter in quest of his game, feels only the ardor of pursuit. His
whole mind is concentrated on that and the hunter's selfishness, the
desire of possession, fills his heart. Ignorance and thoughtlessness
destroy the birds.
Every one knows in a general way that birds render most valuable
service to the farmer, but although these services have long been
recognized in the laws standing on the statute books of the
various states, it is only within a few years that any systematic
investigations have been undertaken to determine just what such
services are, to measure them with some approach to accuracy, to weigh
in the case of each species the good and the evil done, and so to
strike a balance in favor of the bird or against it. The inquiries
carried on by the Agricultural Department on a large scale and those
made by various local experiment stations and by individual observers
have given results which are very striking and which can no longer be
ignored.
It is a difficult matter for any one to balance the good things that
he reads and believes about any animal against the bad things that he
actually sees. The man who witnesses the theft of his cherries by
robin or catbird, or the killing of a quail by a marsh hawk, feels
that here he has ocular proof of harm done by the birds, while as to
the insects or the field mice destroyed, and the crops saved, he has
only the testimony of some unknown and distant witness. It is only
natural that the observer should trust the evidence of his senses, and
yet his eyes tell him only a small part of the truth, and that small
part a misleading one.
It is certain that without the services of these feathered laborers,
whose work is unseen, though it lasts from daylight till dark through
every day in the year, agriculture in this country would come to an
immediate standstill, and if in the brief season of fruit each one
of these workers levies on the farmer the tribute of a few berries,
the price is surely a small one to pay for the great good done.
Superficial persons imagine that the birds are here only during the
summer, but this is a great mistake. It is true that in warm weather,
when insect life is most abundant, birds are also most abundant. They
wage an effective and unceasing war against the adult insects and
their larvae, and check their active depredations; but in winter the
birds carry on a campaign which is hardly less important in its
results.