VERDICT for WATER-OUZEL. 65 



stone. I suspect that insects and their larvae, 

 with small -shelled mollusks, constitute their 

 principal food ; and it may be that their 

 labours in this way are rather beneficial than 

 otherwise ; for as many aquatic insects will 

 attack the ova and fry, their destruction must 

 be an advantage. I believe, indeed, that 

 birds generally, nay always, do good rather 

 than harm in the check they give to the 

 undue extension of insect-life ; and it is not 

 a little interesting to observe how their varied 

 forms are adapted to this particular end. 

 There is no element, and scarcely a situation, 

 in which insects can live, that is out of the 

 reach of their more powerful enemies the 

 birds/' 



The water-ouzel having, therefore, been 

 fairly put on his trial, the verdict first arrived 



