viii. INTRODUCTION. 



be said to be spent more innocently than those of the rapa- 

 cious kinds, all contribute their services to man, by clearing 

 the earth of the seeds of noxious plants, as well as the trees 

 of innumerable destructive insects, with which they feed 

 their young, and claim for themselves, meanwhile, but a 

 small return of the produce of the fields and gardens, which 

 too often is ungratefully begrudged them. 



Nearly the whole of this amusing group appear to relieve 

 each other, and are, in succession, the constant neighbours, 

 or attendants on the habitations of men. They are the sub- 

 tenants of the cultivated world, and most of them, especially 

 those that are granivorous, may well be termed wild poultry, 

 and are the valued property of the sportsman. Some of 

 these, also, uniting with others of the soft-billed tribe, form 

 the husbandman's cheerful band of choristers, whose comings 

 and goings proclaim the seasons ; while, by their notes, pour- 

 ed forth from every tree, and vale, and woody glen, they en- 

 liven the face of nature. But having described this division 

 of birds in the former volume, we must now bid them adieu, 

 with this testimony of their usefulness that they are the in- 

 dustrious regulating little messengers of Providence, without 

 whose assistance the plough and the spade would often find 

 their labours bestowed in vain; and weak as these instru- 

 ments may appear, without their aid, instead of a land of 

 overflowing plenty, adorned with flowers and fruits, and 

 trees and woods, in rich luxuriance, and in all their varied 

 beauty, where every grove is made vocal with responsive 

 praises, we should too frequently meet with nothing but the 

 barrenness, and the silence, and the dreariness of a desert. 



Leaving those denizens* of nature to enjoy their own 

 native woods, the sheltering coppice, or extended plain, the 

 task now assigned us is to delineate the figures and to 



* "Behold the fowls of the air, for they sow not, neither do 

 they reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly father feedeth 

 them." See Matt. vi. 26. 



