ga THE HOUSE SPARROW 
THE HOUSE SPARROW 
PASSER DOMESTICUS 
Crown and back of the head dark bluish ash; lore, throat, and front of the 
neck black; above the eyes a band of uniform reddish brown, inter- 
mixed with a few small white feathers; upper feathers dark brown, 
edged with reddish brown; a single transverse white bar on the wing ; 
cheeks, sides of the neck, and under parts greyish white. Female— 
head, nape, neck, and breast ash-brown ; above the eye a light yellowish 
brown streak ; rest of the plumage less bright. Length five inches and 
Peete Eggs white, spotted and speckled with dark grey and 
rown. 
WHAT were the haunts of the Sparrow at the period when men 
dwelt in tents, and there were neither farmhouses nor villages, much 
less towns and cities, it were hard to say. Certain it is now that 
thoroughly wild Sparrows are not to be met with in districts remote 
from human dwellings and cultivation; they have left the hill- 
side and forest as if by common consent, and have pitched their 
tents where man builds, or ploughs, or digs, and nowhere else. In 
the city, the seaport town, the fishing village, the hamlet, the farm- 
house, nay, near the cot on the lone waste and by the roadside 
smithy, they are always present, varying in the amount of con- 
fidence they place in their patrons, but all depending on man to 
a certain extent. And not only do they court his society, but 
they have adopted his diet. Whatever is the staple food of a 
household, the Sparrows that nestle around will be right pleased to 
share it ; bread, meat, potatoes, rice, pastry, raisins, nuts, if they 
could have these for the asking, they would not trouble themselves 
to search farther; but obliged, as they are, to provide for them- 
selves, they must be content with humble fare ; and so skilful are 
they as caterers, that whatever other birds may chance to die of 
starvation, a Sparrow is always round and plump, while not a few 
have paid for their voracity by their lives. Much difference of 
opinion exists as to whether Sparrows should be courted by man 
as allies, or exterminated as enemies. The best authorities on 
this point have come to the conclusion that their numbers must 
be lessened, and that the most humane way to do this is to tear down 
nests before the young are hatched out. The fact that great 
efforts are at the present time being made to introduce them into 
New Zealand, where the corn crops suffer great injury from the 
attacks of insects, which the presence of Sparrows would, it is 
believed, materially check, leads to the conclusion that their mission 
is one of utility. That Sparrows consume a very large quantity 
of corn in summer there can be no doubt ; as soon as the grain has 
attained its full size, and long before it is ripe, they make descents 
on the standing corn, and if undisturbed will clear so effectually 
of their contents the ears nearest to the hedges, that this portion 
of the crop is sometimes scarcely worth the threshing. During 
