1 88 SOME RECENT QUESTIONS IN ORNITHOLOGY. 



have been made with the view of finding out, if possible, the 

 cause or causes which are accountable for bringing about 

 this very undesirable state of things. After more or less 

 mature deliberation some attributed it to one cause, some to 

 another, and some to a combination of causes. Many were 

 disposed to believe that the introduction of the English Spar- 

 row lay at the bottom of the whole trouble ; in the eyes of 

 some the "feather-venders " had all to do with it, while from 

 other quarters the blame was attached entirely to the taxid- 

 ermists and the bird collectors. As far as the writer has 

 seen or heard not much importance has ever been attached 

 to any other cause as a means of destruction of bird-life, 

 with perhaps the exception of the introduction of large light- 

 ing apparatuses in many places, where no doubt thousands 

 of birds at night are yearly destroyed. 



For more reasons than one the introduction of the English 

 Sparrow into this country was an expensive blunder, but 

 that they are chiefly responsible for the disappearance of 

 many of our native species of birds in the localities we have 

 mentioned, I never have in that view been a firm believer. 



That the indiscriminate slaughter of small birds for mil- 

 linery purposes, by conscience-ridden dealers, was for a long 

 time a prime cause has been proven beyond cavil, and such 

 people should simply be prosecuted by all the rigor of the 

 law, and made to desist quite as promptly as that party who 

 would commit any act that threatened the agricultural in- 

 terests of the country, for no one will question for a moment 

 but what the removal of our insectivorous birds does that 

 very thing. Were all the birds in the country destroyed 

 there is no power known to man that could check the 

 enormous increase in insect-life or the destruction of plant- 

 life that would follow as a consequence. Such a wholesale 

 disturbance of Nature's balance will not occur ; while on the 

 other hand I am not prepared to say whether the recent known 

 decrease in our birds in certain localities has been followed 

 by a corresponding increase of any particular species of 



