64 CHARACTER@IN FEATHERS. 
had been on their own native heath, amid the 
scrub-oaks and huckleberry bushes; but after 
their departure it was remembered that they 
had not once been heard to utter a sound. If 
self-possession be four fifths of good manners, 
our red-eyed Pipilo may certainly pass for a 
gentleman. 
We have now named four birds, the chickadee, 
the goldfinch, the brown thrush, and the to- 
whee, — birds so diverse in plumage that no 
eye could fail to discriminate them at a glance, 
But the four differ no more truly in bodily shape 
and dress than they do in that inscrutable some- 
thing which we call temperament, disposition. 
If the soul of each were separated from the body 
and made to stand out in sight, those of us who 
have really known the birds in the flesh would 
have no difficulty in saying, This is the titmouse, 
and this the towhee. It would be with them as 
we hope it will be with our friends in the next 
world, whom we shall recognize there because 
we knew them here; that is, we knew them, 
and not merely the bodies they lived in. This 
kind of familiarity with birds has no necessary 
connection with ornithology. Personal inti- 
macy and a knowledge of anatomy are still two 
different things. As we have all heard, ours 
is an age of science; but, thank fortune, mat- 
ters have not yet gone so far that a man must 
