BIRDS IN GENERAL. 



13 



While the young are yet unfledged, and 

 continue in the nest, the old ones take care to 

 provide them with a regular supply ; and, lest 

 one should take all nourishment from the rest, 

 they feed each of the young in their turn. If 

 they perceive that man has been busy with 

 their nest, or has handled the little ones, they 

 abandon the place by night, and provide their 

 brood a more secure , though less commodious 

 retreat. When the whole family is com. 

 pletely plumed, and capable of avoiding dan- 

 ger by flight ; they are then led forth when 

 the weather is fine, and taught the paternal 

 art of providing for their subsistence. They 

 are led to the places where their food lies ; 

 they are shown the method of discovering or 

 carrying it away ; and then led back to the 

 nest, for a day or two longer. At length, 

 when they are completely qualified to shift for 

 themselves, the old ones take them abroad, 

 arid leading them to the accustomed places, 

 forsake them for the last time ; and all future 

 connection is ever at an end. 



Those birds which are hatched and sent 

 out earliest in the season are the most strong 



business they were engaged during the greatest part of 

 the day. Allowing twelve hours to be thus occupied, a 

 single pair of these birds would destroy at least six hun- 

 dred insects in the course of one day; on the supposition 

 that the two birds took only a single insect each time. 

 But it is highly probable that they often took more. 



Looking at the matter in this point of view, the des- 

 truction of insectivorous birds has in some cases been 

 considered as productive of serious mischief. One strik- 

 ing instance we distinctly recollect, though we cannot 

 at this moment turn to the book in which it is recorded. 

 The numbers of the crows or rooks of North America 

 were in consequence of state rewards for their destruc- 

 tion, so much diminished, and the increase of insects so 

 great, as to induce the state to announce a counter re- 

 ward for the protection of the crows. Such rewards are 

 common in America; and from a document given by 

 Wilson, respecting a proposal made in Delaware " for 

 banishing or destroying the crows," it appears that the 

 money thus expended sometimes amounts to no incon- 

 siderable sum. The document concludes by saying, 

 " the sum of five hundred dollars being thus required, 

 the committee beg leave to address the farmers and 

 others of Newcastle county and elsewhere on the sub- 

 ject." 



From its sometimes eating grain and other seeds, 

 " the rook," says Selby, " has erroneously been viewed 

 in the light of an enemy by most husbandmen ; and in 

 several districts attempts have been made either to banish 

 it, or to extirpate the breed. But wherever this mea- 

 sure has been carried into effect, the most serious injury 

 to the com and other crops has invariably followed, from 

 the unchecked devastations of the grub and caterpillar. 

 As experience is the sure test of utility, a change of con- 

 duct has -in consequence been partially adopted ; and 

 some farmers now find the encouragement of the breed 

 of rooks to be greatly to their interest, in freeing their 

 lands from the grub of the cockchafer, an insect very 

 abundant in many of the southern counties. In Nor- 

 thumberland I have witnessed its usefulness in feeding 

 on the larvse of the insect commonly known by the name 

 of Harry Long-legs, which is particularly destructive to 

 the roots of grain and young clovers." 



It has on similar grounds been contended, that the 



and vigorous ; those, on the other hand, that 

 have been delayed till the midst of summer, 

 are more feeble and tender, and sometimes in- 

 capable of sustaining the rigours of the ensu- 

 ing winter. Birds themselves seem sensible 

 of this difference, and endeavour to produce 

 early in the spring. If, however, their efforts 

 are obstructed by having their nests robbed, 

 or some similar accident, they still perse- 

 vere in their efforts for a progeny ; and it 

 often happens that some are thus retarded till 

 the midst of winter. What number of eggs 

 any bird can lay in the course of a season is 

 not ascertained ; but this is true, that such as 

 would have laid but two or three at the most, 

 if their nests be robbed, or their eggs stolen, 

 will lay above ten or twelve. A common 

 hen, if moderately fed, will lay above ahundred 

 from the beginning of spring to the latter end 

 of autumn. In general, however, it obtains, 

 that the smallest and weakest animals are the 

 most prolific, while the strong and rapacious 

 are abridged by sterility. Thus, such kinds 

 as are easily destroyed, are as readily repair- 

 ed ; and Nature, where she has denied the 



great number of birds caught by bird- catchers, particu- 

 larly in the vicinity of London, has been productive of 

 much injury to gardens and orchards. So serious has 

 this evil appeared to some, that it has even been pro- 

 posed to have an act of parliament prohibiting bird- 

 catchers from exercising their art within twenty miles 

 of the metropolis; and also prohibiting wild birds of any 

 kind from being shot or otherwise caught or destroyed 

 within this distance, under certain penalties. It is very 

 clear, however, that such an act could never be carried ; 

 and though it might be advantageous to gardens, orchards, 

 and farms, yet the attacks which the same birds make 

 on fruit would probably be an equivalent counterbalance. 

 In the case of swallows, on the other hand, it has 

 been well remarked by an excellent naturalist (the Rev. 

 W. T. Bree,) that they are to us quite inoffensive, while 

 " the beneficial services they perform for us, by clearing 

 the air of innumerable insects, ought to render them 

 sacred and secure them from our molestation. Without 

 their friendly aid the atmosphere we live in, would 

 scarcely be habitable by man : they feed entirely on in- 

 sects, which if not kept under by their means, would 

 swarm and torment us like another Egyptian plague. 

 The immense quantity of flies destroyed in a short space 

 of time by one individual bird is scarcely to be credited 

 by those who have not had actual experience of the fact." 

 He goes on to illustrate this from a swift, which was 

 shot. " It was in the breeding season when the young 

 were hatched ; at which time the parent birds, it is well 

 known, are in the habit of making little excursions into 

 the country to a considerable distance from their breed- 

 ing places, for the purpose of collecting flies which they 

 bring home to their infant progeny. On picking up my 

 hapless and ill-gotten prey, I observed a number of flies, 

 some mutilated, others scarcely injured, crawling out of 

 the bird's mouth ; the throat and pouch seemed absolutely 

 stuffed with them, and an incredible number was at 

 length disgorged. I am sure I speak within compass 

 when I state that there was a mass of flies, just caught 

 by this single swift, larger than when pressed close, 

 could conveniently be contained in the bowl of an ordin- 

 ary table-spoon." Habits of Birds. Library of En- 

 tertaining Knowkdge. 



