DOMESTICATED BIRDS 



Domestication of Animals mainly accomplished by the Aryan Race ; Small Amount of Such 

 Work by American Indians.— Barnyard Fowl : Mental Qualities ; Habits of Combat. 

 —Peacocks : their Limited Domestication.— Turkeys : their Origin ; tending to 

 revert to the Savage State.— Water Fowl : Limited Number of Species domesticated ; 

 Intellectual QuaHties of this Group.— The Pigeon : Origin and History of Group ; 

 Marvels of Breeding.— Song Birds.— Hawks and Hawking.— Sympathetic Motive of 

 Birds : their Esthetic Sense ; their Capacity for Enjoyment. 



It is an interesting fact that about all the work of domes- 

 tication which has been done by man has been accomplished 

 by the peoples of Asia and mainly by the Aryan race. The 

 American Indians tamed the llama and alpaca and a few 

 species of native plants ; even where their habits were pre- 

 vailingly sedentary they domesticated no birds. It was left 

 for Europeans to make use of the wild turkey. Our primitive 

 people had the same chance to tame ducks and geese as the 

 folk of the Old World. They appear, however, to have lacked 

 all capacity for such endeavors. The same lack of disposition 

 to capture and tame wild creatures is noticeable among the 

 characteristic peoples of Africa ; all of which serves to show 

 that the domesticating art, at least as applied to animals, is 

 peculiar to the higher-grade folk of the Old World. 



Of all the birds which have been domesticated, our com- 

 mon barnyard fowl has been by far the most useful to man. 

 It has become in a way interwoven with his life to a degree 

 found only in a few of our barnyard animals. Next after the 

 pigeons and the pigs it has been most deeply impressed by 



