Song Birds and Water Fowl 



tion, of this clearly defined branch of the sub- 

 ject, will prevent, except in individual cases, 

 such extensive acquaintance as one may have 

 with land birds, yet the occasional species which 

 even the most casual observer, or the most un- 

 favorably situated student, will now and then 

 come across, or of which he will read, are 

 surely invested with a new interest by being 

 brought into systematic relation with the full 

 and magnificent scheme of the world's avi- 

 fauna ; while the general reader, whose knowl- 

 edge of the water fowl is about as great as that 

 of the land birds — seeing that he knows almost 

 nothing of either — will find the former quite 

 as entertaining, in many respects, as the lat- 

 ter. 



Let me preface this general view of water 

 fowl by saying that, as compared with land 

 birds, they are just as distinctive in their traits 

 as in their habitat. Human nature is such 

 that the difficulty of getting a thing makes us 

 particularly desire to have it ; so that it is not 

 one of the least attractive aspects of water fowl 

 that, whereas land birds, as a group, come to 

 us, we ourselves must, as a rule, go to the 

 water birds. Their haunts are not, even in 

 their migration, along the roadside, in fields 



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