4 DESTRUCTION OF BIRDS. 



domestic animal ha3 so many. We all admire "poor pussy," she is our 

 earliest playmate, gentle, pretty, and useful as a mouser, but she has the 

 lion's nature, she is still of the order Felis, and in reality a wild beast, 

 and where opportunity occurs, the wild nature comes out, and she is therefore 

 subject to the contingencies attending it, and, like other wild animals, is 

 prolific enough to make the supply equal to the demand. 



In the state of things I am supposing, the fruits of the ground would 

 arise without tillage, and be gathered without labour and without being 

 the exclusive property of any one, and hence such an equality of right 

 would exist, that the birds would have the same title to the corn or the 

 cherry as a rational being. But this state of things does not exist, and 

 therefore, when time, and labour, and money are expended in the producing, 

 although the natural territory of the bird may be, to a certain extent, 

 invaded, and the natural supply lessened, still man labours for a return 

 and is clearly entitled to it, and therefore if the numbers of birds remain 

 the same, with a less field for their support, the question arises, are they 

 to be supported to his detriment? Now, if under these circumstances, some 

 of them are destroyed, certainly this comes not either under the head of 

 wanton or superstitious destruction, and although it may be a sad one, still 

 it is a real necessity. 



I know it has been said that Sparrows, or Larks, or Buntings, let them 

 be ever so numerous, cannot consume sufficient to create any loss to the 

 farmer; I have seen it otherwise, and it is notorious how pea-fields and 

 fruit-gardens are often entirely stripped of their produce by these gentry. 

 This is on the general question, and then comes that branch to which 

 Mr. Fuller especially refers, namely, the indiscriminate destruction for some 

 supposed object, and by too great a number of the feline race being kept. 

 Now, with regard to "collecting" birds as specimens, my own notion is 

 this; my earliest memories, and bright and pleasant ones they are, are 

 associated with the contemplation of natural objects, and the contemplation 

 only; I would sit for hours, (without metaphor,) watching the movements, 

 habits, and appearance, both of birds and animals, and had no thought of 

 appropriating or destroying them. Then came the time of boyhood, and 

 with it, I confess, the destructive tendency common to that age, but as 

 I soon became a bird-stuffer, and an "indifferent good" hand, I really had 

 some excuse, but there was still the innate propensity to possess, and I 

 fear that by gun and stone, (for I was an excellent shot with this latter 

 primitive weapon,) I knocked down many a luckless songster which was 

 not made any use of, and I look back upon that time with deep regret, and 

 have always, and shall always do my best to prevent such useless cruelty 

 in those of the same age. 



I entirely agree with Mr. Fuller upon the destruction of our most 



