278 An American Fruit-Farm 



other animal. Its circulation is more rapid. It is 

 more active also. To keep up this higher tempera- 

 ture, this more rapid circulation, this greater 

 activity, it must eat more in proportion than any- 

 other animal. Birds are the biggest eaters in the 

 world — not even excepting people who patronize 

 picnics. This explains the daily consumption of 

 a nine-mile trainload of insects in Pennsylvania 

 alone. We have added in a like tonnage for the 

 other States of the Union; add in the tonnage for 

 Eiu-ope, Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, 

 the Isles of the Sea! Who can compute the ton- 

 nage? Now we can dimly understand the state- 

 ment made by men who speak by the strength of 

 accurate knowledge that, if insects are not ciu'bed 

 in some way, this planet will become uninhabitable 

 for man in less than twenty years. I believe that 

 the facts warrant cutting this length of time in 

 half. So of course, kill birds! Pass laws to kill 

 them! Encoiu-age pothunters to kill them! Cats, 

 ever more cats to kill them! Kill the (cats?) birds, 

 and, like Herod of old, be devotu*ed by worms ! 



Birds are essential to human life. No birds, no 

 people. Charles Darwin proved once and for all 

 that there would be no soil were there no earth- 

 worms. Robins appear to have read Darwin's 

 famous book on Earthworms, They also seem to 

 know about cutworms and some other like friends 

 of man found in gardens. Of course black cut- 

 worms and grubs are more to be desired than 

 robins. Some people have the perversity to believe 



