STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 65 



but all capitalists were engaged so pleasantly in seeing the worms go 

 down that they gave him no attention. Here capital made a grand mis- 

 take, for one must readily see from the abundant proof that from the 

 amount of worms eaten by each and every sparrow fifty of them would 

 furnish guano enough, of most perfect quality, unleached and unweath- 

 ered, to render the whole State of New Jersey as fertile as a garden, even 

 after allowing a very large margin for waste. 



When the sparrow business was "red-hot," a renowned scientist, 

 whose opinions were sought for and accepted as facts, undoubtingly, on 

 two continents, ventured to thus write : " The English sparrow is, in the 

 strictest sense of the word, a graminivorous bird, more closely so than 

 any member of its family, the Fringe Uidce ; its young are fed, to some 

 extent, while in the nest, on soft insects, such as the larvae of j/«d!// moths, 

 found feeding on grass and leaves. The principal food of the adult bird 



is horse- ." No farther word of the learned scientist's essay on 



the English sparrow was read by any of the sparrow maniacs, and things 

 became lively generally. It were better for that poor scientist had he 

 never been born, for column after column of the most abusive abuse was 

 hurled at his head. The pastors of all the churches denounced him from 

 their pulpits ; Boston called a meeting in Faneuil Hall, at which the 

 most learned politicians of the country were invited to give the true 

 scientific habits of the sparrow, his worming capacity, and the ultimate 

 benefit that would accrue from his introduction to our greatest national 

 industry — agriculture. Laws were passed making it felony to insult a 

 sparrow, or to cause the death of one; no one was able to invent a law 

 severe enough. The ridiculous craze went on until every town in our 

 country is swarming with the dirty, noisy, pugnacious, entirely-useless, 

 and will-soon-become-very-noxious English sparrow, to the almost com- 

 plete exclusion of our every way better and songful native birds. 



Did the sparrows destroy the worms in New York City and Phila- 

 delphia? No, the worms disappeared by reason of their natural insect 

 enemies. I have sat in Franklin Square, in Philadelphia, in August, with 

 the sparrows swarming around and under trees entirely defoliated by 

 caterpillars, and with their trunks nearly covered by their cocoons and 

 eggs, and have watched the sparrows there and in other places for hours 

 closely, day after day, without seeing them eat an insect of any kind ; I 

 saw them eat grass, crumbs and offal; I saw one play with a caterpillar 

 for a long time, but he did not eat it. 



So mucli for jumping at conclusions, delusions and unscientific 

 science. (Laughter and cheers.) 



DISCUSSION UPON THE REPORT. 



Dr. Thomas. — I am somewhat amused at the latter part of the paper, 

 but there is no question that a mistake has been made in the introduction 

 of the English sparrow, which is absolutely useless ; but as relates to the 

 matter of birds performing no important part in the destruction of insects, 

 this is going a little too far. In Europe, in some places, birds in former 



