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The English Sparrow Discttssed. 



sparrow. We who have watched the sparrows from 

 the first year of their introduction into the country- 

 know them to be useful and interesting. They have 

 freed our trees from canker worms (we do not tar 

 them now), they eat the pupa of the caterpillars (we 

 seldom see a caterpillar now), they destroy the clothes 

 moth in embryo, and they are busy scavengers of 

 our public streets and yards. They are constantly 

 at work, ivinter as well as summer. They do not 

 diive away our native birds. The foresters in the 

 Washington, New York, Boston and Philadelphia 

 public gardens and commons, all give their testimony 

 to the contrary, saying that robins, blue birds and 

 yellow birds, and others, build by the side of them. 

 The scarcity of native birds is owing to men and 

 boys shooting them, and women's cruelty in wearing 

 them on hats and bonnets. 



Besides this, every school boy has to make a col- 

 lection of birds' eggs, and some take pleasure in their 

 wanton destruction. 



The only thing I have observed, that most who 

 complain of them have against the sparrow is, they 

 soil the houses, but I think it ill becomes man to 

 complain of any animal for being dirty or quarrel- 

 some or thievish ; let him look at his own species. 

 Eesides and above all the benefits the sparrows confer 

 on us is this: they have comforted, amused, and in- 

 terested the old, the young, and the sick. It has 

 teen one of our greatest pleasures (in our loneliness 

 and bereavement) to watch and feed them. 



All birds have their enemies who wish their de- 

 struction. It was not many years ago that some one 

 in London complained of the numerous doves, and 

 tried to effect their destruction. But it was found 

 that some kind-hearted person had left a fund for 

 them to be fed twice a day at Guild Hall, and this 

 prevented it. 



In West Peabody there is a farmer who kills 

 robins, and hires boys to do so. His old father (I 

 am happy to say he is dead now) used to go round 

 and punch the bottoms of the robins' nests after they 

 had built them. In some places they make pies of 

 robins. I should as soon think of eating a piece of 

 a baby ! 



In old times crows were thought nothing of, and 

 every one shot them at will. Now, there is a law in 

 England to protect them, as they kill hard-shelled 

 bugs the smaller birds cannot. 



Now I hope you will be convinced a little, that 

 -when God made the sparrows, He made them for 

 some purpose, and if we do not know it, it only shows 

 our ignorance. These European sparrows are the 

 ones the Saviour loved and noticed when he pointed 

 to them and said, "Your heavenly father cares too 

 for them." 



I am told by English people that they value the 

 sparrow next to the robin, and their numerous spar- 

 rows are the reasons they have such heavy crops. 



If you would oblige a lady, I wish you would have 

 this published in some paper your way, to let people 

 know the little sparrow has friends. 



Get2eral Spinner s Rejoinder. 

 Pablo Beach, Florida, Dec. 19, 1887. 



Dear Lady — Your very interesting letter, of the 

 nth instant, has been received. While your sym- 

 pathy for the feathered biped brigand, the English 

 sparrow, does you credit, I think it is misplaced. I 

 can only account for it, on the supposition that you, 

 like many others of your sex, have a perverted 

 sympathy for the worst kind of criminals. Place a 

 bloody red-handed murderer in prison, and directly 

 you will see a stream of refined ladies passing to the 

 murderer's cell, bearing to him all kinds of dainties, 

 choice flowers, and a profusion of misdirected sen- 

 timental sympathy. They pass by the suffering 

 poor ; they have no more sympathy for these 

 than they would have for the oriole and the blue 

 bird, that are persecuted by the merciless European 

 sparrow. 



You do well to call him the European sparrow, for 

 he is the pest of the whole continent of Europe. 

 He leaves England early in the season, and joins his 

 fellow marauders on the continent. By the agricul- 

 turists of all Europe, and of our own country as 

 well, he is considered the greatest of pests, and to 

 them is a positive nuisance. 



You have discovered virtues in this vagabond of a 

 bird that naturalists have strangely failed to see. 



We in America have sparrows, ' ' to the manor 

 born," that are insectivorous; but, the fraud of a bird, 

 that we are considering, is strictly granivorous. If 

 your birds in Salem are as you describe them to be, 

 they differ from any that I have observed. They 

 must be witches, and under the traditional law of 

 your town should be burned. It is, however, no 

 doubt true, that those sparrows that live in cities be- 

 have themselves better than do their rustic cousins. 

 They, of the country, despoil the grainfields and the 

 gardens, while your pets in the cities riot on horse- 

 droppings. There is no accounting for tastes. 



But you are not at all singular in your estimate of 

 the city sparrow. He evidently differs from the 

 fellow in the country. I have a young lady friend 

 and correspondent, who is a naturalist, and who has 

 made birds her especial study, who in regard to what 

 I had written concerning the English sparrow, wrote 

 me as follows : 



"As to the sparrow — yes. I am a murderer in 

 theory, and here in the country I would be one in 



