CHAPTER XIV 



CRUELTY TO BIRDS 



" The chief interest of the leisure of mankind has been found 

 in the destruction of the creatures which they professed to believe ' 

 even the Most High would not see perish without pity." 



I HAVE touched upon different ways in which 

 birds are neglected and improperly treated in cap- 

 tivity, but there are many things yet which human 

 beings have to realise more fully and more universally 

 with regard to cruelty. 



People of some nations are much more humane 

 to dumb animals than those of others. 



Northern nations are fonder of them, as a rule, 

 than southern. But even in England, the country 

 far excellence where birds and animals are kept in 

 a superior way, there is much to be corrected and 

 rectified. 



Amongst birds in a wild state there is that 



abominable and ruthless destruction of particular 



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