26o 



being used for breeding it has in addition egg food all 

 through the spring and summer. (The influence 

 against longevity that is ascribed by fanciers to the 

 breeding itself may be dismissed as a minus quantity.) 

 Of course we see that this advantage is due to the 

 progress made towards immunity on the part of the 

 Canary, as previously pointed out, and to the fact 

 that the hybrid can never be as immune as the Canar}^ 

 by reason of the legacy of susceptibility bequeathed 

 by its feral ancestors. Were the travelling and the 

 colouring agent alone the causes of death — and here 

 there is no question of comparative immunity — then 

 the mortality of the show Canar}^ would be on a par 

 with that of the hybrid, and if the fact of breeding 

 made for shortness of life, then that, coming as it does 

 on the top of the former, would serve to turn the 

 scale and actually shorten the life of the Canary, as 

 compared with that of his half bred son. 



Now that we have watched the exhibition mule 

 being sacrificed at an early age, partl}^ to satisfy the 

 senseless dictates of fashion, and partly to do honour 

 to the Juggernaut of tradition, let us see what happens 

 to his happier brother that is kept only for song. 

 Having survived the dietetic dangers to which he was 

 so freel}^ exposed during the period of his early 

 infancy, and being probably " only a Sparrow " as to 

 looks, his owner finds a purchaser for him at about 

 three half-crowns in the person of some unsophisticated 

 soul whose only idea of bird keeping is that it will be 

 pleasant to have a songster in the house. It is true 

 that some such birds as this, through being kept close 

 up to the ceiling to be poisoned by mephitic vapours 

 or else just above the sash joint of a draughty window 

 to be killed b}^ bronchitis, can only manage to struggle 

 on for a comparativeh^ short time, but on the other 

 hand it is no uncommon thing to find others that have 

 lived happily for man}^ years in one house, dying at 

 last of sheer old age and natural decay. But these 



