The Canary Book. 



of some ingenious and industrious fancier, and whilst 1 

 admire them as works of art and masterpieces of workman- 

 ship, I regret I cannot recommend them as fitting habitations 

 for birds ; for, with very few exceptions, all such cages lack 

 that most essential requirement utility. Every consideration 

 of comfort and convenience is sacrificed to carry out the 

 design in its entirety, and hence many of those cages are, 

 despite their external grandeur, mere dungeons for canaries 

 and other birds. Nevertheless, I am a great advocate for 

 handsome cages; but what I admire most is artistic skill, 

 combined with elegance of design, practical utility, and sound, 

 substantial workmanship ; for I consider a good bird worthy 

 of a good cage, upon the same principle as I contend that a 

 good picture is deserving of a good frame. 



It is the highest ambition of some fanciers to possess high- 

 class birds, and, so long as they succeed in accomplishing 

 this object, they care little as to what kind of tumble-down, 

 broken, twisted, rickety, rusty, patched-up cages they keep 

 them in. They appear to go upon the principle of the 

 bucolic Scotchman, who, so long as he received good victuals, 

 did not care in what fashion they were served ; whereas an 

 epicure which in this instance I will compare with a 

 genuine lover of birds is generally as particular about the 

 manner in which his viands are served as he is about the 

 viands themselves. I have heard it said that half the enjoy- 

 ment of a good dinner is in the way it is placed on the 

 table, and in order to enjoy a good bird I consider it ought 

 to be leen in a suitable cage; in this I feel confident that all 

 true lovers of those pretty little choristers will agree with 

 me. I consider it a gross insult to good taste to place birds 

 of undoubted excellence and merit in cages which are not 

 worth as many pence as their occupants are worth pounds. 

 Besides, a good, well-made cage will outlast a dozen flimsy 

 common ones, to say nothing of the difference in appearance. 



CAGE-MAKING. If you have a latent tendency to the 

 mechanical in your composition, and are possessed of a little 

 ingenuity as well, you only require patience, perseverance, 



