291 



ever, for the reputation of this drug, which is b}' the 

 way not unknown to medical men, and which I am 

 not by any means condemning, the poor little bird a 

 few days afterwards had one or two fits and died. 

 Now what would have happened if by good luck that 

 particular bird had permanentl}^ recovered through 

 his own inherent powers of resistance ? Why the 

 "certain cure" would have been immediately pub- 

 lished in print, with the "experience" to prove it, 

 and there you are, don't you know ! And if, let us 

 say, thirty or even twenty per cent, of such cases were 

 in the habit of spontaneously recovering, quite 

 independently of that or any other drug, the validity 

 of our friend's conclusion would be immediately 

 established and the drug would get the unmerited 

 credit of being in these cases a veritable precious balm 

 of Gilead. 



Those who extol egg food as a fitting sustenance 

 for insectivorous birds are not perhaps in such plight 

 as the gentlemen just adverted to, but their claims to 

 serious attention only differ in the matter of degree. 

 Generally speaking the experience put forward by 

 them is just the limited and narrow amount that has 

 fallen to their own share in a comparatively short span 

 of years. Some few, it is true, go a step further and 

 affect to adduce a general experience on the part of 

 aviculturists extending over a whole centur\^ Lest 

 by the exercise of any undue moderation on their 

 part their argument should lose any weight to which 

 it may be entitled I would point out that this estimate 

 is probably much too little, for, as I have previously 

 shewn, not only has egg food been used for Canaries 

 while breeding for considerably more than two hundred 

 years, but we also find from different i8tli century 

 sources that it was even then traditionally well known 

 to some as an article of diet recommended for various 

 warblers and other soft bills. But whatever the exact 



