Nov. 1884.] 



AND OOLOGIST. 



139 



sibly, because I have not had the benefit of the aesthetic 

 teaching of John Sullivan, so apparent in "W. W. C.'s" 

 style ; or more probably, for the reason that they put no 

 l( pease in my shoes." 



Fearing that Mr. Lucas will not follow to reply to a writer 

 who, after dodging responsibility behind initials, descends 

 to substituting abusive sarcasm for arguments, yet offen- 

 sively "requires facts" in order that he may " show the 

 fallacy of his" (Mr. Lucas') "statements," thus forfeiting 

 all rights to a reply ; my " sympathies for the writer at the 

 exhibition of his utter ignorance" (or worse,) are so aroused 

 that I will try and refer him to some few of the "facts in 

 the case." 



Passing his tirade against the " gentle idiots whose volu- 

 minous contributions of sweet sentiment," written to gain 

 the " approving recognition of some fair damsel or maiden 

 aunt," with the reminder that such writers as Longfellow, 

 Beecher, Kingsley, Waterton, Thomas, and others, 

 must share his delicate epithets, it must be admit- 

 ted that even the fear he expresses at the simple P. 0., 

 address given by Mr. Lucas, hardly justifies the conclusions 

 he records as facts. Mr. Lucas is not the "taxidermist of the 

 U. S. National Museum," and so lays no claims to the 

 " Therefore ought and ergo does know," so kindly supplied 

 by » W. W. C." 



But in denying the right of Mr. Lucas to speak with au- 

 thority on that basis, " W. W. C." is franker than in other 

 portions of his letter. It is true that only a small propor- 

 tion of the birds sacrificed in the name of science and taxi- 

 dermy, are legitimately so used. No taxidermist or sci- 

 entist advertises for an unlimited number of one or two 

 species of birds, or receives hundreds of birds a day for 

 " scientific purposes." 



The skin and egg collectors have too long bidden their 

 operations under the scientific cloak; why is " W. W. C." 

 " shakey" lest the matter should be settled ? 



For a few figures that will interest our questioner, I will 

 respectfully refer him to an editorial in Forest and Stream, 

 for August 7, too long to quote, but not by any means ex- 

 hausting the subject. Ellis and Webster advertised in the 

 spring for Purple Grackles, Blue Jays, and other bright 

 colored birds. Perhaps they can furnish some light on the 

 subject by telling us the result in bird skins received. 



Has " W. W. C." never been among village boys, that he 

 questions the damage they do ? I thought it was an ac- 

 knowledged evil, coming as periodically as the spring-time, 

 and affecting a new set of boys each year. In this section 

 it generally strikes the boys when about ten or twelve years 

 old, and may be compared in its effect to the 

 postage stamp rage with boys of larger places ; but 

 unfortunately birds are more valuable than old envelopes 

 and so the damage to the community is greater. It may 

 start with one boy in a village as the first indication of a 

 coming naturalist. It quickly spreads to all his playmates 

 as simply a competitive craze to get the greatest num- 

 bers and variety, stimulated perhaps by seeing a cash value 

 affixed in some dealer's catalogue. From the scattered na- 

 ture of this collecting, it is not possible for me to speak 

 with exactness as to the damage done any more than it 

 would be possible to be exact in an estimate of the damage 

 done by the birds of prey. In the two or three places 

 where I have been able to observe, I should say the boys 

 had much more to answer for than the Hawks and Owls. 



" W. W. C." begs off on the "error of enumerating the 

 insects plus their progeny— while there might be millions in 

 it, we can afford to let it pass, and confine ourselves to the 

 main question." We will let him off when we have re- 

 minded him that in 1875 one county in Missouri (Jackson, j 

 paid a tax to this error of $2,500,000, three others $2,000,000 

 each, an aggregate of $15,000,000 for twenty-six counties. 



That a few newly settled and comparatively sparsely popu- 

 lated states and territories lost about $200,000,000 in four 

 years from the same causes, "might get distracting." 



When "W. W. C." asks us to "remember the great poet 

 says 'little fleas," etc., would he as a naturalist, advise us to 

 try and rid a kennel of vermin by letting the job out to the 

 " lesser fleas and so ad infinitum t" 



Harris estimates 4,800 species of insects in Massachusetts. 

 Can you show a list of 240 (one to twenty) birds ? And 

 you cannot tell the effect of removing the check which na- 

 ture has put on one of the 4.S00. Ont from under the good 

 dame's restraint, it may develop unthonght of possibilities. 

 Instauce the potato beetle. In 1S63 it was a haess in-rlm 

 sect, feeding on a weed in Nebraska. Civilization advancing 

 westward paves a broad road with better food for our 

 friend, and graded it by shipping east by the carload the 

 grouse and quail of the country. About twenty years ago 

 the potato came within reach of the bug, and presto! the 

 manufacture of Paris green is a great business in the land ! 

 Maine alone paid $50,000 for her 100 tons this last season. 



Flag alludes to forest tracts in Virginia and Carolina in 

 which hundreds of acres were stripped by the larvae of a 

 species of borer beetles, when alocal persecution had driven 

 off the Wood Peckers, charged with injuring the trees. 



Dodge says that in 179S the forests of Brandenburg and 

 Saxony, were almost destroyed by the larvae" of moths, 

 which found lodgments in the branches and fed upon the 

 tender wood. Examination by naturalists showed that the 

 disappearance of several species of Wood Peckers and Tit- 

 mice was the cause. 



Buff on tells of the subjugation of Locusts that had been 

 accidentally introduced in the Isle of Bourbon, by import- 

 ing Indian Grackles also. 



In Europe, whenever the Sparrow has been declared con- 

 traband, and measures for its extermination taken, the in- 

 crease of insects has compelled the revocal of such laws. 



Prof. Aughey says that the settlers of Nebraska destroy- 

 ed vast numbers of birds, Black Birds especially, by poison- 

 ing. He estimated for Dakota county alone 38,000, in a 

 single autumn. The birds visited the corn fields and 

 stripped the end of the ears to get at a grub that infested 

 the corn. The farmers thought that they were destroying 

 the corn, and after soaking grain in strychnine, piled up the 

 dead birds in heaps three or four feet high. A few years 

 later a government report printed extracts from letters from 

 fifty counties, (four states,) in which the farmers testify to 

 the good offices of the birds "especially Black Birds" in 

 destroying the Locusts. 



In Massachusetts Prof. Jenks tells how on election day 

 at Bridgewater, about sixty years ago, birds were killed at 

 a shooting match in such numbers that they were sold to 

 the farmers for fertilizer. As a result of the scarcity of 

 birds that followed, " tufts of withered grass appeared and 

 widened into miles sere and scorched, destroyed by the 

 larvae of insects." These are but a few of the many in- 

 stances that could be cited to prove that the legend of 

 " The Birds of Kilhngworth" is not overdrawn. 



I think that " W. W. C." will admit that they are quite as 

 valuable in proving the nicety of the adjustment of the 

 balance of nature, as even the statistics from the "time 

 immemorial" of Mexico and Peru would be if they could be 

 procured. The few hundred birds, taken in a tropical 

 climate, with the rude instruments of savages, to be worn 

 as cloaks and head-dresses by savage chiefs, would bear 

 about the same ratio to the numbers slaughtered for the 

 adornment of civilized millinery, as the gold used by the 

 same chiefs as bracelets, and nose rings, would to that car- 

 ried as watches and jewelery by his brothers of the Hub. 



