Miscellaneous. 193 



air, and brought back again immediately at the pleasure of its 

 owner. I have seen it fly upon the tops of houses at the 

 opposite side of the street, and this, too, in a populous town, 

 where a considerable amount of traffic was being carried on at 

 the time. I have known this bird be away out of sight for 

 several minutes, and the person to whom it belonged bring it 

 back in less than one minute, simply by a well-known call or 

 whistle. This bird was taught, so I was told, by kind treat- 

 ment alone. There are several methods of teaching birds these 

 tricks, such as clipping some of their wing feathers, and using 

 ingredients to stupefy them ; sometimes hunger is resorted to, 

 but there is no necessity to adopt any of those cruel practices in 

 order to domesticate them. If you wish to teach a bird to come 

 and go, to alight upon your finger, to eat from your mouth, &c., 

 procure one about five or six weeks old, and place it in a cage 

 very near to you during the day -time, and talk to it frequently, 

 give it a little green food occasionally, or any little dainty; 

 after it becomes familiar with you, open the door of the cage, 

 and let it range the room at its pleasure. At first it will most 

 likely fly about rather wildly, and against the window panes, but 

 take no heed of this, merely notice it by saying, "Dickey!" 

 "Dickey!" "Pretty Birdie!" Before you give the bird its 

 liberty, secure the window and also the door ; in fact, lock it, lest 

 any one should open it from the outside and let out the bird, for 

 if it got out and you were necessitated to go after it and catch it 

 you would scare it very much, and it would have a most preju- 

 dicial effect upon its nerves. Before you give the bird its liberty, 

 prepare a little hard-boiled egg chopped small, and mixed with a 

 little bread or biscuit, or some other tempting morsel, and place 

 it near you upon a plate or saucer ; after a while the bird will 

 have the hardihood to come and partake of it, and if you take no 

 particular notice of it, it will, in the course of a few weeks, or 

 sooner, come and take it quite audaciously, as its confidence will 

 increase rapidly, provided it is in no way molested at first. Do 

 not attempt to catch it to put it back in its cage, as it will be 

 sure to return to it of its own accord if left alone ; it is merely 

 a question of time. Persevere with this treatment daily for a 

 few weeks, and it will soon become as tame as could be desired; 



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