BIRDS OF THE WEST 



little husband, and he sings like a concert tenor. Nurserymen re- 

 joice when they hear the voice of the cuckoo echoing from some hid- 

 den corner of their orchard, for they know that the cankerworms 

 are at their last banquet. 



We accuse the mosquito of carrying fever germs and no doubt 

 it is guilty. Think how many human lives must be saved by the 

 nighthawks, chimneyswifts and the swallows, yet gunners, I beg 

 pardon, "sportsmen", practice on them because they are swift of 

 flight. The kingbird is charged with eating honey-bees but he eats 

 only the drones except when he guesses wrong. Do you think he 

 is any more anxious to swallow a bee with, a stinger than you are? 

 Still people must have their pleasure and if the little birds must 

 be shot, shoot the English sparrows for if there are Mormons in the 

 bird-world, they are guilty, and if feather emblems must adorn 

 your hats, use the goose-quill, for honestly "a bird in a bush is 

 worth two on a hat". 



When we begin to appreciate the worth of things rather than 

 their values, we begin to live. Then a frog means more than a 

 pair of edible legs, and I have seen the very human little fellows 

 put their hands over their faces to ward off the blows that were 

 to send them to the market. Is not a quail on its nest better than 

 a quail on toast? Does it not bear the same relation to birds that 

 the trout does to fishes, just a little dearer than most of the others ? 

 Neither was made to lie in the market and if they must be taken 

 let it be where the feathered choir is chanting a requiem and the 

 heather bells are tolling. 



