JIM CROW 53 



sale extermination of the crows would be exceedingly 

 unwise, as is any violent disturbance of the balance 

 of nature, I confess the campaign of one of our 

 largest powder-manufacturing companies, just after 

 the war ended, to organize a " National Crow 

 Shoot," filled me with shame and indignation. 

 Trading, of course, on the average farmer's preju- 

 dice against crows, and the average person's igno- 

 rance of them, this powder company, solely to sell 

 more shells (which fact they practically confess 

 in their circular letter of January 29, 1919, to pow- 

 der-dealers), goes against the expressed and matured 

 judgment of the government experts and endeavors 

 to slaughter all the crows it can. Powder com- 

 panies have done worse things than this in the past, 

 to be sure. They have even encouraged hatred of 

 men. But this alone is sufficient to convince me 

 that all ammunition-works should be owned and 

 controlled by the government and conducted with- 

 out profit. 



In spite of the crow's instinct to feed on the eggs 

 and young of other species (which he shares in com- 

 mon with several other birds), who would really 

 wish to see him exterminated, even if it were pos- 

 sible to exterminate so resourceful a fellow? His 

 destruction to crops is certainly far less than that 

 of the bobolink in the Southern rice-fields. He is 

 an efficient scavenger, and his destruction of white 

 grubs, cutworms, wireworms, and grasshoppers is of 

 great value. Above all, however, his place in our 

 landscape is such that his passing would leave a 

 dreary void. Winter or summer, we are conscious 

 of him against the sky, against the fields, or senti- 



