SO GALLING. 



rally speaking, the partridge is therefore part and parcel of 

 our agriculture ; and though the farmer may see it only as 

 an evil, in the portion of grain that it destroys, yet it must 

 have good in it, and that good must counterbalance the evil 

 must be a positive surplus for the advantage of a man. The 

 weevils, the cynips and the tipule, come along with cultivated 

 grain and cultivated vegetables and roots, in countless 

 myriads, to consume those surplus seeds and grains which, if 

 man did not take them for his use, would choke all else and 

 each other. But as man takes the produce of the vegetables, 

 the partridge and the other birds which frequent the culti- 

 vated fields, come and consume that which, but for them, 

 would deprive man of his produce, and do it in a way which 

 he could not prevent, or very materially check. It is true 

 that, when the insects have disappeared for the season, and 

 those seeds which the birds have been so instrumental in 

 preserving are matured, the birds take their share ; but, in 

 justice, why should they not ? they are the preservers of the 

 whole. 



It is the same with the whole winged creation. The spar- 

 row does not follow man wherever he lives, and twitter 

 around the cottage for mere mischief; neither do the birds of 

 summer come from a far country, and carol from the groves, 

 or hunt in the garden, as the enemies of man. Even in wild 

 nature, man has no enemy ; and that which invariably 

 accompanies improvement, is, we may rely upon it, necessary 

 to improvement. If we could reckon up how many cater- 

 pillars two sparrows pick from the trees and buds in the 

 course of rearing one brood, we should deem the sparrow on 

 the house-top as much our servant, and as worthy of his little 

 reward, as the domestic under the roof. 



No doubt we should be impartial, for even the caterpillar 

 has its use, within certain limits ; and it is only within cer- 

 tain limits that any creature or thing is useful. Our art in 



