212 IN BIRD LAND. 



by a kite-String that swung in a loop from the roof 

 of my house, — a case of involuntary suicide. A 

 nuthatch that I saw one day in the woods had its 

 leg broken, and I could not help thinking of its 

 lingering agony before it would starve to death. A 

 pet nonpareil, a dear, bright- hued little fellow, was 

 well and happy one evening ; but the next morn- 

 ing he lay dead on the bottom of the cage, perhaps 

 the victim of a convulsion. Another pet nonpareil 

 was not in good health ; so I thought a bath in tepid 

 water might be good for him ; but alas ! the ablu- 

 tion prove4 too much for the little invalid, which, in 

 spite of our utmost efforts to save his life, succumbed 

 to the inevitable. A like fate befell a young turtle- 

 dove which a neighbor found in the woods and 

 brought me for a gift. 



But the cause of a great deal of mortality among 

 birds is man's inhumanity to them. The thirst for 

 blood seems to be inherent in many coarse natures, 

 and as killing a fellow-man is illegal and almost sure 

 to be summarily punished, many men gratify their 

 greed for gore by slaying innocent birds and 

 animals. 



" Butchers and villains, bloody cannibals ! 

 How sweet a plant have you untimely cropped I 

 You have no children, butchers I if you had. 

 The thought of them would have stirred up remorse." 



The small boy with a sling or a spring-gun or an 

 air-rifle is a source of much grief to the birds. He 

 even kills the tiny kinglets that flit to and fro in the 

 trees bordering our streets, and seems to think it 



