228 VERTEBRATA 



Reports from Maine, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Indiana, 

 North Dakota, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas stated that 

 more than half their birds had disappeared, while observers 

 from Connecticut, Florida, and Montana agreed that the 

 numbers of birds in those states had decreased by seventy- 

 five per cent. The seriousness of these facts becomes 

 apparent only when we realize that recent investigations 

 have shown that there is as much truth as poetry in the 

 lines of Longfellow 



"The summer came and all the birds were dead; 

 The days were like hot coals; the very ground 

 Was burned to ashes ; in the orchards fed 

 Myriads of caterpillars, and around 

 The cultivated fields and garden beds 

 Hosts of devouring insects crawled, and found 

 No foe to check their march till they had made 

 The land a desert without leaf or shade." 



A careful study of the birds emphasizes the necessity of 

 making children familiar with their value, not only from 

 an economic standpoint, but also from an aesthetic view. 

 With the exception of the English sparrow, the cow bird, 

 two species of hawks, and the great horned owl, all birds 

 of our country are man's friends. 



There are about thirteen thousand species of birds in 

 the world, but not more than eight hundred species occur 

 in the United States, and seldom is any one locality favored 

 with more than two hundred kinds. But few lovers of 

 nature can expect to become familiar with more than fifty 

 species in one region. The identification of birds, espe- 

 cially the warblers, vireos, and sparrows, in the bush or on 

 the wing, is not an easy task, but if the beginner proceeds 



