FRIENDS IN FEATHERS 



tions. Every Jay was on a high perch sounding danger signals. 

 With a throb of joy came the realization that I was at home and 

 accepted by my birds; any other was a stranger whose presence 

 was feared and rejected. 



So upon this basis I have gone among the birds, seeking not 

 only to secure pictures of them by which family and species 

 can be told, but also to take them perching in familiar locations 

 as they naturally alight in different circumstances; but best and 

 above all else, to make each picture prove without text the charac- 

 teristics of the bird. A picture of a Dove that does not make the 

 bird appear tender and loving, is a false reproduction. If a 

 study of a Jay does not prove the fact that it is quarrelsome and 

 obtrusive it is useless, no matter how fine the pose or portrayal 

 of markings. One might write pages on the wisdom and cunning 

 of the Crow, but one study of the bird that proved it would ob- 

 viate the necessity for most of the text. A Dusky Falcon is 

 beautiful and very intelligent, but who is going to believe it if 

 you illustrate the statement with a sullen, sleepy bird, which 

 serves only to furnish markings for natural-history identifica- 

 tion? If you describe how bright and alert a Cardinal is, then 

 see to it that you secure a study of a Cardinal which emphasizes 

 your statements. 



A merry war has waged in the past few years over what the 

 birds know; it is all so futile. I do not know how much the 

 birds know, neither do you, neither does any one else, for that 

 matter. There is no possible way to judge of the intelligence of 

 birds, save by our personal experience with them, while each 

 student of bird life will bring from the woods exactly what he 

 went to seek, because he will interpret the actions of the birds 

 according to his temperament and purpose. 



If a man seeking material for a volume on natural history, 

 trying to crowd the ornithology of a continent into the working 



5 



