222 FROM BLUM I DON TO SMOKY. 



should liasten from me as from death ? The 

 answer is plain : my crime is that I am a man. 



There are hundreds of intelligent men and 

 women in New England who do not know a 

 bluebird from a blue jay, a chickadee from a 

 junco, a catbird from a cow bunting. They 

 know them all as birds, and love them as such, 

 after a vague fashion, but of the racial or spe- 

 cific characteristics of these charming creatures 

 they know nothing. What, then, will they say 

 to the avowal that not only do species of birds 

 differ from one another, as Irishmen differ from 

 Swedes, and Spaniards from Chinese, but that 

 individual birds of the same species have, in 

 proportion to the sum total of their character- 

 istics, as much variation as individual men? 

 Of course, there is not nearly the same chance 

 for individuality in birds as in men, for their 

 methods of life and their mental qualities are 

 simple, while those of men are complex. 



To the wood ducks, the fox, the trout, and 

 the butterfly I am merely a man, one of that 

 horrible race of gigantic destroyers which occu- 

 pies the laud and the water, and, with merciless 

 hand, traps, maims, or kills with indiscrimi- 

 nate cruelty. For centuries, all that dwells 

 within the woods or beside the waters has held 

 firmly to life in direct proportion to its distrust 



