CONSIDERATION OF THE ENGLISH SPARROW. 349 



THE ENGLISH SPARROW. 



Some persons have advocated the introduction of the English sparrow in order to 

 mitigate our insect plagiies. Such a policy, it appears to me, would be highly objec- 

 tionable. The moral qualities, or what is near akin to moral qualities, of the English 

 sparrow are bad. Where I have seen this bird in America it has gradually drivea off 

 our small native birds. Around Philadelphia, where it has now monopolized the ground, 

 I last year renewed its acquaintance. I again revisited some of my old haunts where 

 in early life I studied our native birds. I could hardly find a blue bird, a robin, or na- 

 tive sparrow where they were abundant in 1858, 1859, 1860, and 1861. The English 

 sparrow, however, greeted me everywhere. It was the opinion of all that I consulted 

 that it had driven off" the native birds. Certainly this, to say the least, is unfortunate. 

 Many kinds of birds not only give more variety, but they certainly destroy insects of 

 more species than a single one. If we protect our own native birds, and especially if 

 we cultivate groves of timber where they can find shelter, and banish hunting-dogs, 

 guns, and traps, in a comparatively few years the balance of nature must be so re- 

 stored that insects will rapidly decrease and again reach the normal number that pre- 

 vailed at the first settlement of the country. Besides, it is well known that the Eng- 

 lish sparrow has become partially naturalized in a small section of Nebraska. Some 

 years ago, as I have learned from Hon. J. Sterling Morton, the English sparrows were 

 introduced into Nebraska City, and have multiplied to a considerable extent, but the 

 number of species of insects that they feed on, as has been anticipated, has been found 

 to be small. This of course could have been endured, if they were not so hostile to 

 other birds, native to the soil, that do much better. 



Another fact concerning these sparrows, not well known, is that they are only partly 

 insectivorous ; they are more granivorous than insectivorous, and in their native habi- 

 tats they are often destroyed because of their destructive raids on wheat and other 

 grain seeds. They have, therefore, far less claim on our protection and care than our 

 own far more beautiful and more highly insectivorous birds. It is another illustratiou 

 of the fact that sometimes we go abroad for that which we have in greater perfection 

 at home. 



The logic of this paper is not affectfed if the assertion is true that civilization natur- 

 ally causes an increase of insect life, even though the number of birds should not be 

 diminished. If this were true, then it could be still legitimately claimed that to offset 

 this increase of insect life increased protection should be given to our birds. Our birds 

 should be made to increase in proportion to the increase of insect life which civiliza- 

 tion produces, if this theory is correct. And the argument for the necessity of increas- 

 ing the number of birds is strengthened by the alleged fact, if fact it be, that the prog- 

 ress of civilization destroys great numbers of the lower and smaller mammalia, such 

 as moles and skunks, that largely or entirely feed on insects. These ought not and 

 cannot, for other reasons, be voluntarily perpetuated. Birds, however, can be substi- 

 tuted for them with advantage to the beauty, if not to the harmony, of nature. 

 Here, as elsewhere, the slightest apparent causes often change the ordinary economy 

 of nature, and man, who is such an efficient agent of change, must sooner or later use 

 his mental superiority in planning remedies for the ills which his thoughtlessness or 

 criminality has produced. 



WHAT PUBLIC SENTIMENT NEEDS. 



Public sentiment is still in need of being corrected on the subject of man's duty to 

 brute, and especially to bird, life. Unfortunately, a certain portion of the people still 

 justify making birds a mark for trials of skill in the use of fire-arms. At certain 

 seasons of the year a portion of the secular journals contain notices of shooting- 

 matches, where thousands of pigeons are butchered to see who can hit oftenest at 

 short range with a shot-gun. Pigeons are bought for this purpose, and after being 

 brought to the so-called sporting-grounds and kept cooped until the shooter is ready, 

 the poor bird is let go to be riddled with shot, if the marksman is sober and skillful 



