108 HOUSE SPARROW. 



eaves of our crowded cities, or in the fields and 

 country lanes, this impudent chirper is so abundant 

 that I think he may be looked upon as a real pest, 

 in spite of all the strong arguments which naturalists 

 have advanced in his favour, such as, for instance, the 

 statement of Jesse that a pair, whilst feeding their 

 young, destroy on an average 3300 caterpillars in 

 a week, besides other insects. Dixon says of its 

 destructive habits : " Although it feeds on the seed 

 of the charlock and the dock and other seeds, it is 

 also, unfortunately, very fond of grain. Kept in 

 proper bounds it is undoubtedly a useful bird, but its 

 increase is rapid and its enemies so few, that unless 

 its numbers are kept down by artificial means it soon 

 becomes a perfect pest. I have known farmers in the 

 north of England cease from growing corn at all or 

 only in the smallest quantities entirely owing to the 

 inroads of the Sparrow, and I have seen fields of corn 

 so stripped by them that the straw was the only re- 

 compense the farmer got ; of course this is in the 

 neighbourhood of large towns. It is not what the birds 

 absolutely eat, although one Sparrow will take its bulk 

 of corn in a day, but what they waste by shaking it 

 to the ground, or breaking the straws. The Sparrow 

 must be kept under. It has been introduced into the 

 United States, and its increase is so rapid that the 

 day will come when our American cousins will repent 

 of having introduced such a destructive souvenir of 

 home." 



In addition to grain and seed, the Sparrow will 

 also feed upon insects, and may be often seen hawk- 

 ing a large fly or butterfly. It is very fond of washing 

 itself in puddles, and also of dusting itself in the road 

 much in the same manner that chickens will. 



