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the birds' feet, and if you are fortunate euough to live 

 in the country you need not bother about cleaning 

 them when dirty ; throw them away and go and get 

 some fresh ones. The thoughtful person though would 

 probably reverse the order of these two operations. 



It is quite unnecessary, and indeed undesirable, 

 for the beginner in foreign bird keeping to pay more 

 than a very moderate price for his birds, however deep 

 his pocket may be. (What constitutes a moderate 

 price at any given time can only be ascertained by 

 glancing through the dealers' lists, or their advertise- 

 ments which appear in all the birdy papers and 

 magazines). The more common the bird, the better 

 for the purpose of our amateur. It is obvious that in 

 spite of all one's good intentions there is a greater 

 possibility of losses occurring through lack of ex- 

 perience at that time than at a later stage ; and the 

 financial loss will be small if low-priced birds are 

 bought. 



But this is only a superficial reason. I will go 

 deeper and say that the cheaper the bird the better 

 chance it has, provisionally, of coming successful!}'' 

 through the initiatory stages of its owner. And the 

 reason is not far to seek. 



Like the majority of people the importers of 

 foreign birds give far more care and attention to the 

 merchandise which will realise the highest price, and 

 consequently expensive birds are looked after much 

 better than those whose market value is only a few 

 pence. So it becomes a question of the survival of 

 the fittest. The highly priced bird has to endure very 

 few of fortune's hard knocks, whereas his lowly brother 

 is bundled over with hundreds of others in the same 



