Introductory Note. ix. 



stale upon the ground ; water vessels are dirty and the water 

 foul, if not forgotten altogether. He who leaves things thus to 

 chance had better not keep birds ; it is not his line. 



Method involves regularity and thoroughness. The same 

 thing should be done each day at the same time. With a definite 

 hour to which to look forward, the birds will each day be in the 

 same state of preparedness, their food will come at the proper 

 interval after the last supph', and those birds that only feed once 

 in the twenty-four hours will be sharp-set and ready for their 

 meal ; the sitting bird will often leave the nest at feeding lime, 

 while mates that sit alternately will be inclined to make feeding 

 time an occasion for the change. Regularity applies to cleaning 

 as well as to feeding. Since birds have to be disturbed for 

 purposes of cleaning, it is best that this should be done at stated 

 hours, so that they may have the same daily period of non- 

 disturbance and may come to know exactly "where they are." 

 Their keeper should move about in the aviaries in a methodical 

 manner, and always as far as possible move in the same way, 

 and should make no sudden or startling movement. A most 

 useful practice is, always before entering an aviary or enclosure, 

 to make a quiet whistle or other sound in order to prepare the 

 birds for a visitor ; only it is well always to make the same 

 whistle or the same sound, and the\' will soon learn to connect 

 it with the coming of a friend. One might almost go farther and 

 say it is well always to wear the same coat and the shabbier the 

 better. (Birds have a great dislike to black coats and white 

 linen). 



Cleanliness. Insistence on this point one might suppose 

 to be little needed, but it is not so. One sees but too often 

 aviaries and cages that are very far from receiving the attention 

 they properly demand. In the best-managed of the large col- 

 lections known to the writer— that of the Emperor of Austria at 

 Schonbrunn — cleanliness is carried to such a degree that keepers 

 (the}' are women) clean each day with sponge and water even the 

 twigs of the enclosed trees or shrubs. This is a counsel of per- 

 fection that we may not all be able to follow. But we can at 

 least see tliat perches are kept clean ; that new boughs are sup- 

 plied when the bark is worn off the old ones ; that no refuse nor 



