no THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



era algebra, prepared the way in which were to follow with 

 giant steps, making themselves illustrious, Descartes, Fermat, 

 Pascal, and finally Newton. Translated for The Popular Sci- 

 ence Monthly from La Nature. 



BIRDS' JUDGMENTS OF MEN. 



BY M. CUNISSET-CARNOT. 



WE put animals under all sorts of contributions, taking even 

 their lives for our necessities, pleasure, and caprice, with- 

 out once considering what their views may be of our proceedings 

 or of us, or whether they have any views. We need not doubt 

 that they have views, and some very definite ones. Mute wit- 

 nesses of our lives, they examine, observe, and judge us ; and some 

 judge with a marvelous accuracy. 



Birds, in particular, are all the time fluttering around us ; they 

 witness all our motions, interpret all our gestures, and very quickly 

 form a perfectly just opinion of our character. The selection ex- 

 ercised by swallows has been remarked they are said never to 

 build their nests, except in quiet houses and the prudence of the 

 crow, which readily marks the difference between a harmless pe- 

 destrian and a hunter, and always keeps itself out of reach of the 

 sportsman's gun, is well recognized. The accuracy of the obser- 

 vation of birds goes beyond this ordinary sagacity, and I am cdn- 

 vinced that those birds which reside near man utilize for their 

 advantage, security, or pleasure a multitude of very complete, 

 fine, and judicious remarks which they make concerning their 

 dangerous neighbor. I will tell here of two recent examples as a 

 contribution to the study of the pyschology of birds. 



The house I live in is situated in a faubourg of Dijon, in the 

 midst of a garden surrounded by other gardens. The quarter is 

 a chosen haunt of birds nightingales, warblers, tomtits, finches, 

 redthroats, wrens, etc., are abundant, besides the innumerable and 

 undisciplinable army of sparrows. All the people of the house 

 profess for the inhabitants of the garden feelings of the highest 

 sympathy, which are manifested in numerous good ways by bath- 

 ing-troughs judiciously placed in the shadows of thickets, various 

 seeds put in good places where they will be found, by leaving the 

 nests in absolute solitude, etc. There result such a cordiality and 

 security of relation between our birds and us that the former 

 sometimes manifest a familiarity in our quarters exceeding the 

 limits of good taste. 



Some time ago, the weather being pleasant, although it was as 

 yet but little after six o'clock in the morning, I was working with 



