110 THE HOUSE SPARROW. 



lack of proper nurture, would dwindle to reasonable 

 proportions, and life would lose much of its poetry and 

 romance. Consequently, the mind, no longer clogged 

 by these enervating fetters, would grow to its full 

 stature, and life be brought to a higher and nobler plane. 

 A new era would then be ushered into existence — the 

 millennium of scientific truth. May the day speed on 

 swiftest pinions which will inaugurate this felicitous 

 change. 



Coming back from this digression to the subject-mat- 

 ter of discussion, the disreputable character of the spar- 

 row is too well known to the candid and unbiassed ob- 

 server, to leave in his mind any reasonable doubt. But 

 if my readers have had neither the leisure nor the 

 patience to examine into its life-history, I would re- 

 spectfully solicit their careful perusal and earnest con- 

 sideration of the innumerable facts which occur in 

 Chapter II., and also of the corroborative evidence which 

 is largety accumulated in the succeeding chapter. If 

 they bring to the task a mind divested of preconceived 

 opinions and national prejudices, thej r cannot help yield- 

 ing assent to the following facts, which the writer holds 

 to be incontrovertible: — 



1. That in all localities which are cursed by the pre- 

 sence of sparrows, indubitable evidence exists of their 

 extreme irritability and pugnacity. 



2. That our smaller native species, the only rightful 

 tenants of the soil, which have always been adequate to 

 every emergency that has arisen, except in localities dis- 

 arranged by human interference, are vigorously assailed 

 and forced to flee before these irascible creatures. 



3. That in situations which once afforded shelter and 

 security to many of our insectivorous birds, the noisy 



