220 ADVENTURES AMONG BIRDS 



small boy brain it seemed that they might have 

 restrained themselves a little and allowed me to enjoy 

 seeing them for an hour or two. But as their flutter- 

 ings and strainings and distressing cries continued 

 I opened the cage and allowed them to fly away. 



Looking back on that incident now, it strikes me 

 as rather an inhuman thing to have done; but to the 

 boy, whose imagination has not yet dawned, who 

 does not know what he is doing, much has to be 

 forgiven. He has a monkey-like, prying curiosity 

 about things, especially about living things, but little 

 love for them. A bird in a cage is more to him as a 

 rule than many birds in a bush, and some grow up 

 without ever getting beyond this lower stage. Love 

 or fondness of or kindness to animals, with other 

 expressions of the kind, are too common in our 

 mouths, especially in the mouths of those who keep 

 larks, linnets, siskins, and goldfinches in cages. But 

 what a strange "love" and "kindness" which deprive 

 its object of liberty and its wonderful faculty of 

 flight! It is very like that of the London east-end 

 fancier who sears the eye-balls of his chaffinch with 

 a red-hot needle to cherish it ever after and grieve 

 bitterly when its little darkened life is finished. 

 "You'll think me a soft-hearted chap, but 'pon my 

 soul when I got up and went to say good-morning 

 to my bird, and give him a bit of something to peck 

 at, and found poor Chaffie lying there dead and cold 

 at the bottom of his cage, it made the tears come 

 into my eyes." 



It is love of a kind, no doubt. 



