4258 Birds, %c. 



furnish hints for the management of living collections. I find that 

 among birds, the diseases of which they die are seldom indicated with 

 accuracy during life, and though often preventible, are also often in- 

 curable when once fully established. This shows that the mortality 

 in collections is to be most certainly lessened by prevention. The 

 medical treatment of sick birds is of little avail in the present state of 

 our knowledge. But I also find that many deaths occur without much 

 disease existing, merely from some temporary condition of the sys- 

 tem ; such, for instance, as suffocation, fainting, or inanition, from too 

 long fasting, improper food, or eating too much at one time, from 

 fright, over-exertion, cold, or exposure to the weather, from ill- 

 ventilated houses, from resting in an unfavourable posture, from wash- 

 ing while in a weakly state, from accidental loss of blood, and from 

 various other transient causes to be detected by observation, which 

 suffice to kill a weakly bird ; while the ailment from which the bird 

 was suffering would not have sufficed to cause its death, but might, if 

 the bird was cared for and sustained, have disappeared of itself. 

 Thus are indicated the frequent administration of carefully selected 

 food in small quantities at a time, the removal from water, except just 

 what suffices to quench thirst, the confinement to a limited space, the 

 quiet, warmth, shelter, and separation from other birds, the free access 

 of air, and the absence of nooks and corners to mope in, which collec- 

 tors well know to be essential to the safety of their sickly specimens. 

 This resembles what is met with in medical practice, where every 

 now and then the treatment has to be directed not against the disease, 

 but against the tendency to death from trivial causes which it induces, 

 from the weak state into which it throws the patient. 



The observations now suggested, if continued and extended in the 

 course of years, will, by-and-bye, indicate with accuracy the causes 

 and symptoms of the maladies of birds and animals, and so lead to 

 their prevention and cure. Nor is this all. A higher end will be ob- 

 tained. Our knowledge of Natural History will be made more per- 

 fect, by learning to what diseases birds and animals are subject, and 

 after what manner individuals and races die out. We shall also dis- 

 cover what diseases or causes of death are superinduced by a state of 

 confinement, over and above those which are incident to the same 

 creatures when living in their natural wild state. We shall then see 

 how far such affections are analogous to those which occur in man, 

 and by the light thus collaterally thrown upon them, the diseases of 

 humanity, our knowledge of which is daily increasing, will be yet 

 better understood; and thus, in the course of years, will be laid the 



