THE BIRD SUPPLY 

 Increase of Garden and Farm Birds. — The effect of 

 civilization on the bird hfe of North America has been 

 both pronounced and varied in character. Ask almost 

 any one over fifty years of age if there are as many 

 birds about the country as there were when he was a 

 boy, and invariably he will answer "No!" This re- 

 ply will be made, not because all birds have decreased 

 in numbers, but because there has come a change 

 in the man's ideas and viewpoint; in short, the 

 change is chiefly a psychological one. The gentle- 

 man doubtless does not see the birds as much as he 

 did when he was a boy on a farm, or if he does, they 

 do not make the same impression on his mind. It is 

 but another example of the human tendency to re- 

 gard all things as better in the "good old times." 

 Let us turn then from such well-meant but in- 

 accurate testimony, and face the facts as they exist. 

 I have no hesitation in saying that with many species 

 of Finches, Warblers, Thrushes, and Wrens, their 

 numbers in North America have greatly increased 

 since the first coming of the white men to our shores. 

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