PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 213 



sport. More senseless and wicked still was the fash- 

 ion in vogue a few years ago, perhaps not yet quite 

 obsolete, which compelled the massacre of thousands 

 of bright-hued birds for feminine — I should say 

 unfeminine — adornment. To say nothing of the 

 " loudness " and bad taste of such a fashion, it is 

 extremely unwise to put birds to death, for no one 

 can compute the number of injurious insects they 

 annually devour. A bird on the bonnet means so 

 much less bread on the table. A bird in the orchard 

 is a sort of scavenger and pomologist combined, and 

 does his share in giving you a dish of fruit for dinner. 

 The scarlet tanager looks like a living ruby in a 

 green tree ; but — I speak bluntly — it looks like a 

 chunk of gore on a woman's bonnet. In behalf of 

 good taste and the birds, I enter my protest against 

 this barbaric custom. 



True, birds have elements of the Adamic nature 

 in them. Ma*ny of them do relish forbidden fruit, 

 and must be driven off, lest they rifle your cherry- 

 tree ; but it is seldom necessary to kill them, even 

 then, especially those that live wholly on insects and 

 fruit. 



A correspondent once sent me a number of 

 queries. How do birds come to their " last end " ? 

 Do none of them die natural deaths ? If they do, 

 why do we never, or at least very rarely, find dead 

 or dying birds in the fields and woods? My re- 

 sponse to these questions is : Very few birds die 

 natural deaths, • — that is, merely of sickness or old 

 age, — though a few of them may. When a bird 



