EVIDENCE.— FROM EUROPEAN PUBLICATIONS. 343 



If one-fourth of the young Sparrows hatched in England are fed for ten days on 

 fourteen caterpillars apiece, it is easy to make a calculation of how many they would 

 eat in a large agricultural county like N'orfolk. Norfolk contains eight hundred 

 parishes ; say that eight hundred young Sparrows are annually hatched in each par- 

 ish, that gives us a total of six hundred and forty thousand Sparrows. If one-fourth 

 of them are fed on caterpillars, we should have twenty-two million four hundred 

 thousand of these destructive creatures eaten in this one county alone, every year, 

 "by Sparrows. So that there is a very nice balance to adjust in a matter which the 

 most expert ohserver might find difficult. On the one hand the young Sparrows are fed 

 on a great many caterpillars; on the other hand they are fed with grain, hut this 

 is mixed with weeds and other vegetable matter. Again, there is a side light in which 

 to look at the question. If the Sparrows were dead, how many of these caterpillars 

 would be eaten by other small birds? We may be quite sure that a considerable 

 portion of them would not be eaten, unless chaffinches and greenfinches become more 

 numerous than they are now : and if this was so, would not they speedily hecome much 

 more addicted to corn ? I think there is not a doubt about it. 



Sparrows keep down Weeds. 



Sparrows do much good to the farmer, in conjunction with many other little birds, 

 by consuming vast numbers of the seeds of weeds. I think not nearly enough has 

 been made of this by their friends and supporters. The following is a list of those 

 which have been actually identified, with my authority for each : 



Wild spinach (Chenopodium bonus-henricus), Mr. A. Willis.* 



Knot grass (Polygonum aviculare), Mr. F. A. Lees.* 



Black or corn bindweed (P. convolvulus), Mr. F. A. Lees. 



Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale). 



Goosefoot (Chenopodium album), Mr. F. A. Lees. 



Field mustard (Sinapis arvensis), Professor Macgillivray.t 



Chick weed (Slellaria media), Colonel Russell.* 



Mouse ear (Cerasiium triviale), Professor Macgillivray. 



Wild radish (Baplianus raplianistrum), Professor Macgillivray. 



Dock (Bumex crispus), Mr. F. A. Lees. 



Pale-flowered persicaria (Polygonum lap athifol turn), Mr. F. A. Lees. 



Buttercup, Mr. H. N. Slater. 



These seeds will spread from a hedge, the sides of which arc not hrushed with a 

 reaping-hook in the summer, and make a field very foul; so that every one must ad- 

 mit that Sparrows and small birds generally do some amount of good by keeping 

 them down. A remarkahle instance was mentioned some years ago in the Times, of 

 a field sown with grass and clover seeds, over which a luxuriant growth of knot grass 

 (P. aviculare) spread. The farmer thought that his crop was ruined, hut in Septem- 

 ber such swarms of Sparrows as he had never seen hefore visited the field and fed on 

 the small shining seeds of the knot grass. I regret that I have neither got the date of 

 the letter, nor the name of the writer, the communication, according to a bad prac- 

 tice prevalent among observers, "being anonymous. 



A Sparrow's crop will contain a great many small seeds. Dr. Schleh found three 

 hundred and twenty-one whole seeds of chickweed in the crop of one Sparrow in 

 Germany ! In one shot at Northrepps, in Norfolk, one hundred and forty-seven were 

 actually counted, and many more were ground up into pulp in the gizzard. Diges- 

 tion is rapid, and at this rate a vast number would he consumed in a very short 

 time. 



It need hardly he said that the present contribution, including the table which 

 follows, does not exhaust the Sparrow controversy. It leaves many interesting 

 points almost untouched. 



* In litt. i » British Birds," I, p. 344. 



