THE COUNTRY HOME [chapter 



started alone for the children, and brought his 

 charges safely home. 



But say what we may of high-bred dogs and 

 horses, of Jersey and Ayrshire cows, incontrovert- 

 ibly most important to our prosperity are the birds. 

 I cannot understand why country folk are so gener- 

 ally dull on this subject. In a general way they do 

 like birds, and for some unexplainable reason they 

 especially like the robin, but they know very little 

 of the work of the various families, and the nature 

 of the various birds that inhabit, with them, their 

 homesteads, and they appreciate very imperfectly 

 their service. We could afford to pay the birds 

 high toll for their music alone, but such music is of 

 a scale far too refined for the boor. Nor can such 

 a man see that the helpers, who make the world 

 habitable for us, must have compensative protec- 

 tion and food. The first duty of one who goes 

 countryward for a home is to form an alliance with 

 just as many tribes of useful birds as possible. You 

 will not be able to understand them until you have 

 made a careful study of the laws which govern their 

 communities and their individual lives. They 

 come back to us in the spring in great flocks, and 

 from one town center they divide into groups or 



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