ZOOLOGY. 321 



lent the aid of their experience to the investigations. Insects and 

 birds have been carefully classified according to their several species ; 

 their habits of feeding have been closely observed, and the results as- 

 certained and computed. It has been concluded that by no agency 

 save that of little birds can the ravages of insects be kept down. 

 There are some birds which live exclusively upon insects and grubs, 

 and the quantity which they destroy is enormous. There are others 

 which live partly on grubs and partly on grain, doing some damage, 

 but providing an abundant compensation. A third class, the birds 

 of prey, are excepted from the category of benefactors, and are 

 pronounced too precipitately, we think to be noxious, inasmuch 

 as they live mostly upon the smaller birds. 



If the arrangements of nature were left undisturbed, the result 

 would be a wholesome equilibrium of destruction. The birds would 

 kill so many insects that the insects could not kill too many plants. 

 One class is a match for the other. A certain insect was found to 

 lay 2,000 eggs, but a single tomtit was found to eat 200,000 eggs 

 a year. A swallow devours about 543 insects a day, eggs and all. A 

 sparrow's nest in the city of Paris was found to contain 700 pairs of 

 the upper wings of cockchafers, though, of course, in such a place food 

 of other kinds was procurable in abundance. It will easily be seen, 

 therefore, what an excess of insect life is produced when a counter- 

 poise like this is withdrawn ; and the statistics collected show clearly 

 to what an extent the balance of nature has been disturbed. Thus, 

 the value of the wheat destroyed in a single season, in one department 

 of the east of France, by the ce'cidomigie, had been established at four 

 millions of francs. The French vines, olives, and even the forest-trees, 

 are also reported as suffering severely from the superabundance of 

 insect vermin ; so that, in consequence of the alarm occasioned, birds 

 are likely to be hereafter protected in France without much legisla- 

 tion, and, indeed, their rise in estimation has been signally rapid. 

 Some philosopher has declared, and the report quotes the saying as a 

 " profound " one, that " the bird can live without man, but man can- 

 not live without the bird." 



This is a splendid confession of past error ; but what is to be done, 

 seeing that the convictions of philosophers have not yet descended to 

 the peasantry ? Are sparrow-catching and birds'-nesting to be made 

 punishable ? Must there be a new system of game laws for the pro- 

 tection of sparrows and linnets ? The question is really pressing. 

 Yet the commissioners, though they distinctly call for " prompt and 

 energetic remedies," and point to the great detriment which agricul- 

 ture is receiving, are evidently doubtful as to the course to be pursued. 

 They suggest, however, that persuasion should be tried before coer- 

 cion, and that schoolmasters and clergy should endeavor to put the 

 question in its proper light before the people. The commission in their 

 report present some curious statistics respecting the extent to which 

 this destruction of birds in France has been of late years carried. 

 They state that there are great numbers of professional huntsmen who 

 are accustomed to kill from 100 to 200 birds daily. A single child, 

 also, has been known to come home at night with 100 birds' eggs, and 

 it is calculated and reported that the number of birds' eggs destroyed 

 annually in France is between 80,000,000 and 100,000,000. The re- 



