PREFACE 
_ Tuts book is intended to interest young peo- 
ple in the ways and habits of birds, and to stim- 
ulate them to further study. It has grown out 
of my experience in talking to schools. From 
the youngest kindergarten scholar to boys and 
girls of sixteen and eighteen, I have never failed 
to find young people intensely interested so long 
as I would tell them about how the birds live. 
Some of the results of these talks that have 
come to my knowledge have been astonishing 
and far-reaching, such as that of one boy of 
seven or eight, who persuaded the village boys 
around his summer home to give up taking eggs 
and killing birds, and watch them instead, and 
who was dubbed “ Professor’ by his eager fol- 
lowers. The effect has always been to make 
children love and respect the living bird. 
It has therefore seemed to me that what is 
needed at first is not the science of ornithology, 
