272 Missotiri State Horticultural Society. 



Those valiant meddlesome little fellows, the wrens, who know- 

 ing themselves to be small as were Napoleon and Alex, the Great, 

 like those warriors, feel the swelling of a mighty spirit within, are 

 more handsome by far. 



So we long ago concluded that two-thirds of the jay's reputa- 

 tion was due to slander, and one-third was owing to misconduct 

 under the stimulus of supposed wrong and depreciation. Treated 

 like a gentleman he might become a highly respectable chai'acter. 

 Surrounded by a more comfortable society, he might conform to 

 good social usages. The result proves we are right. More reflec- 

 tion came. We found that after all your popular, joetted birds 

 had made their visit and gone ; after your fashionable birds had 

 only spent a few weeks to favor the philoprogenitive principle and 

 recruit exhausted nature in our fresher air, had gone to their 

 Southern homes, why here was the jay still abiding with us. 

 True, he takes his young ones and goes off in the warm summer 

 days. Slanderers used to intimate he takes them off to find booty, 

 plunder, eggs, little birds, etc., but he is soon back with all his 

 brood, laughing and calling over u? during the late autumn and all 

 winter long. 



Now if a bird is a farmer's friend because he consumes vermin, 

 worms, bugs and the like, what shall be said of one who not only 

 eats the like, but hunts wg the eggs and winter deposits of these 

 miserable vermin and forages all winter long on such stuff' as he 

 finds under bark, or fastened on limbs of trees. Is he not a 

 thousand times a friend, and shall we destroy him because he may 

 mix his diet with a little grain and fruit for his health ? There 

 are more ways than one of looking at some things. 



So much for birds, and jay birds in particular. 



To really know the nature, characteristics and habits of birds, one 

 must live much in fields, gardens, orchards and woods ; he must have 

 held long and frequent communings with nature, which is the only 

 life I hold worth living. Yet over large districts the life of the 

 country seems passing away ; the whole desire of our people seems 

 to be for town life. The country lad longs for the village near 

 him ; the villager looks to the county seat as his haven of rest, 

 while the loafer around the court house has an eye on the electric 

 lights and jasper pavements of the city. 



Fathers of country homes, would you keep your sons there as 

 you should ? Then see to it that the life of the country has more 

 of innocent and wholesome diversion. While your position, if 

 you would use the intellect given to you by the God of nature. 



