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economy of nature. Valuable as they are for their songs, their 

 lively motions, their gay plumage and their amusing habits, all 

 these circumstances are of minor importance, coraparecl with 

 the benefits they confer upon man, as checks upon the over- 

 multiplication of noxious insects. The fields are greener and 

 the flowers more beautiful in the spring, the fruits of summer 

 and autumn are fairer and more abundant, and all nature is 

 preserved in freshness and beauty by these hosts of winged 

 musicians who celebrate their garrulous revelries in the woods 

 and pastures. 



From a conviction that this general ignorance or imperfect 

 appreciation of the services of birds may lead to momentous 

 consequences, I propose to make a formal vindication of the 

 feathered race, but shall not in any respect exaggerate their 

 importance, I believe it admits of demonstration, that if the 

 birds were exterminated, mankind could not subsist upon the 

 face of the earth. Almost every species is indispensable to our 

 agricultural prosperity. The gunner who destroys ten birds in 

 the spring, secures the preservation of so many millions of in- 

 jurious insects to ravage our crops, and to destroy the trees of 

 our forests and our orchards. Naturalists, in general, will 

 admit the great importance of their services ; but cultivators, 

 who of all persons in the world ought to be the most familiar 

 with the facts that prove their usefulness, are indeed the most 

 ignorant of them ; and they are so full of prejudices against 

 the birds, that they attribute to them a full moiety of the mis- 

 chief perpetrated by insects. There is perhaps not an insect 

 tribe in existence which is not the natural food of some species 

 of the feathered race, and which, if not kept in check by their 

 agency, would multiply to infinity. Calculations have been 

 frequently made, to ascertain the probable amount of insects 

 consumed by single birds. Many of these accounts seem 

 almost incredible ; yet they will, for the most part, admit of 

 demonstration. 



Two difierent methods have been adopted for the purpose of 

 ascertaining this class of facts : first, by watching the birds and 



