INTRODUCTION 



this traffic brings to thousan s of the most 

 beautiful and interesting creatures. To catch 

 and confine in a small cage a wild animal, 

 more especially a bird, accustomed to vastly 

 more freedom and activity than we ourselves, 

 is bad, even when they are otherwise well 

 cared for and provided with proper food ; but 

 this is scarcely ever their good fortune. 

 The dealers obtain them for a small price and 

 give them correspondingly small considera- 

 tion. Dozens are often crowded into a cage 

 so small they can scarcely move, and many 

 perish from suffocation in the hot and poorly 

 ventilated compartments of the ships on 

 which they are sent to other countries. Often 

 the bottoms of these cages are found thickly 

 strewn with the bodies of the victims of this 

 inhuman treatment when at last they are 

 given food and attention. Those which sur- 

 vive to find a purchaser are rarely any more 

 fortunate. The chances are that they are 

 bought by tourists or sailors having no knowl- 

 edge of how they should be cared for and fed, 

 and no opportunity of giving them what they 

 need; and in any case, being usually taken 

 to colder climates, they succumb to pneu- 

 monia or tuberculosis if they do not sooner 

 die from neglect. 



Various small and brightly colored tan- 

 agers, honey creepers and finches, members 

 of the oriole family and parakeets are the 

 most frequent victims of the cage bird traffic, 

 but many other native birds are from time to 

 time offered for sale in the markets. Among 

 animals, the monkeys are the most frequent 

 sufferers. Great numbers of sloths are shipped 



