HINTS TO ORNITHOLOGISTS. 289 
This knowledge of the habits of birds, which at 
once lets you into their little secrets, is only to be 
obtained by a constant attention to the notes and 
the habits of the feathered tribes in the open air. 
It can never be learned in the solitude of the closet. 
Those naturalists who pass nearly the whole of 
their time in their study have it not in their 
power to produce a’ work of real merit. On the 
contrary, it too often happens that they do (most 
unintentionally, no doubt) a great deal of harm to 
science. ‘Travellers, and now and then a foreigner, 
come to them, and desire that they will revise, or 
concoct, or prepare a work for the press. They 
comply with the request. But, having little or no 
knowledge themselves of the real habits of birds, 
they do not perceive the numberless faults in the 
pages which they are requested to prepare for the 
public eye. Hence it is that errors innumerable 
stare us in the face, when we open books which 
profess to treat on the nature and the habits of 
birds. 
What a world we live in! say I, when I read 
that turkey-cocks will break all the eggs of the fe- 
males, for the purpose of protracting their future 
frolics ; and that another species of bird flies away- 
from the nest, when the egg is hatched, in order 
to procure food for the young one. 
I tremble for the welfare of ornithology, when I 
am informed that the ornithologist, now-a-days, is 
not expected to climb lofty trees and precipices, in 
order to ascertain whether the birds which fre- 
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