204 



entering into captivity for the first time the birds are 

 as little immune against the intensified toxin of the 

 bacillus contained in the shipper's box and the 

 dealer's cage, and represeiithig to them a new disease, 

 as are the white Europeans when first introduced 

 to the yellow fever. It is indeed more than possible 

 that they are even less immune, for whereas the 

 European goes within the sphere of influence of 

 the yellow fever of his own free will, and is for- 

 tified by a sea voyage in fresh air, by good food, 

 and by a general adherence to his customar}^ h3^gienic 

 conditions, the bird enters his new environment 

 under conditions specially adapted to lower his 

 general tone, and to weaken his resistive power against 

 a hitherto (to him) unknown agency for evil. The 

 mental and nervous shock attendant on forcible and 

 sudden capture, and the intense and concentrated 

 fear of human beings and of the rest of his new 

 surroundings, are in themselves quite sufficient to so 

 modify his natural power of resistance as to render 

 him specially susceptible to the results of overcrowd- 

 ing and its deleterious concomitants of filthy air, 

 filthy water and filthy food, all swarming with virulent 

 micro-organisms. This then explains the truly awful 

 mortality which obtains not only among our newly- 

 caught native small birds,^' but also among foreigners 

 while on their voyage and during their storage 

 at either end of it. Those that survive the earliest 

 and preliminary stages of captivity are just the 

 select few who for the time being have the greatest 

 faculty of resistance, having either entirely succeeded 

 in resisting infection, or who, having been infected, 

 are either going to ultimately recover or else to 

 eventually succumb after a more or less protracted 



• I once knew a case where a catclier and dealer succeeded in selling 

 only two dozen Goldfinches out of ninety-two dozen. The rest all died in 

 his house, and it is most probable that some of the two dozen that were 

 sold did not live long. 



