96 BEAUTIFUL BIRDS 
live in the same countries that they live in. That 
is because, when a traveller from Europe goes out 
to those countries he always takes a gun—not glasses 
(or if he does take a pair of glasses he does not use 
them, or his eyes either, in the right way), and when 
he sees one of these rare Birds of Paradise, he shoots 
it, or else frightens it away, as I told you. Then, 
when ‘he comes back, he writes his book and tells 
you how he shot it, or tried to shoot it, and then 
he says: ‘‘ Unfortunately, nothing whatever is known 
of the habits of this species.” It is not very wonder- 
ful that /e knows nothing of them, is it? And yet 
this traveller, with his gun, almost always calls himself 
a naturalist. Now a rea/ naturalist is a person who 
loves nature. But is not that a funny way to love 
her—to shoot her children? Depend upon it, that 
one of those little bottles that the demon keeps his 
powders in, is labelled ‘“‘ Natural History”’ or ‘‘ Love 
of Nature.” You know that Az bottles have gene- 
rally a false label on them. 
So, I am afraid I cannot tell you much about 
what the Birds of Paradise do, or how they show off 
their beautiful feathers. Indeed, it is very much 
the same with most other beautiful birds, and for 
the very same reason that I have been telling you, 
because people wi#// shoot, instead of looking and 
watching. Just the little that we know about the 
