Ly OUR BIRD ALLIES. 
welcome visitors? And can the sparrow justly be 
blamed for pursuing, under similar circumstances, an 
exactly similar course of conduct—one, moreover, 
which causes but little, if any, real and appreciable 
injury to man? 
THE destruction of thatch, unfortunately, is a decided 
blot in the character of the sparrow, which can only 
be palliated by a remembrance of its usefulness in 
other ways. It forms an item in the account, in 
fact, a part of the annual payment exacted by the 
bird for its services; and as such it should be 
regarded. 
Or the bud-destroying propensities of the sparrow I 
can find no confirmation, and the evidence thereof 
which I have been able to collect is of an extremely 
slender character. A local gardener certainly telis 
me that sparrows do eat buds; but then local gardeners 
are not always to be depended upon in such matters. 
A lady friend, too, as I have before stated, has told 
me the same ; but, without undue disparagement of 
the fairer half of creation, I may, perhaps, be per- 
mitted to remark that ladies sometimes make mis- 
takes. And none of the correspondents to whom I 
have written upon the subject—and who, as a rule, 
are enemies of the sparrow—have ever known the 
bird to commit damage of such a character. 
As to the political views of the sparrow, I can hardly 
be expected to offer an opinion; and, after all, a 
