EDITORIAL AND GENERAL. 



251 



as if they were no more than stones 

 flung by the hand of a giant ; chunks that 

 would have crashed from roof to base- 

 ment of a sky-scraper dropped a third 

 and nearly a half a mile away. For three 

 minutes the frightful convulsion contin- 

 ued. Then the lurid lights died out of 

 the pall of smoke, and the pall itself 



began to settle. And when it was all 

 over the granite monster that had stood 

 there for unnumbered centuries had, as 

 the engineer rather poetically expressed 

 it, "made way for the new transcontin- 

 ental."-— James Oliver Curwoocl in Put- 

 nam's and The Reader for October. 



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i ORRESPONDENCE 





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AND 



Information 



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CACKLING OF HENS. 



Terre Haute, Indiana. 

 To the; Editor: 



Has any satisfactory reason been 



Woodrow, 

 Indiana State 



given for the cackling of hens after 

 laying? 



Very truly, 



Walter H. 

 Department of Science, 

 Normal School. 



The cackle of the hen may serve two 

 purposes: (1) to notify the cock that she 

 is ready to have his company, and (2) to 

 divert attention from her nest by at- 

 tracting it to herself. 



The cock keeps at a good distance 

 away while the hen is on the nest, and 

 the cackle would serve to bring the two 

 together. The behavior of the jungle 

 fowl suggests this view. — C. O. Whit- 

 man'. 



INDIVIDUALITY AMONG SPARROWS. 



Belfast, Me. 

 To the; Editor: 



An incident showing the difference 

 in intelligence among individuals of the 

 same species of birds came under my 

 notice a short time ago. I was feed- 

 ing, with cracker crumbs, a number of 

 chipping sparrows, Spizella soeialis. 

 Among the crumbs were a few scales 

 a half inch or less in diameter. One 

 of the birds seized one of these scales 

 by the edge, and after trying in vain 



to break it by vigorous shaking, threw 

 it down and flew away in disgust. 

 Another bird hopped along to the re- 

 jected morsel, and after eyeing it a few 

 seconds, gave it a sharp blow in the 

 center with his bill, breaking it into 

 small fragments. He then ate it at his 

 leisure. 



John S. Fkrnald. 



CAN IT BE THE CROWS? 



To the; Editor: 



Our friend, the crow, may be very 

 black, but he is not, in one sense, as black 

 as he is painted. He does his own share 

 in destroying the enemies of the farmer 

 — those otherwise unfindable creatures 

 who contrive to curtail the corn-crops, 

 even in the best regulated of fields. 



But to-day the question the writer 

 would ask concerns potatoes rather than 

 corn. There is no corn, or other vege- 

 table, planted anywhere near the potato- 

 held, which at the usual period of moles- 

 tation was attacked by the industrious 

 potato bug. 



There is nothing in or about the field 

 or its locality which would seem to invite 

 the interest of the crows, yet even- 

 morning, between four and five o'clock, 

 for some time, our neighboring colony 

 of crows, numbering twenty or more, 

 may be seen walking up and down the 

 potato rows, evidently bent upon some 

 absorbing errand which calls them there 

 each morniner with the rise of the sun. 



