220 



RECREATION. 



In addition to the actual good that birds 

 do in the destruction of noxious insects, 

 many of them are engaged for at least y 2 

 of the year in hunting out and devouring 

 the seeds of various weeds and other, to us, 

 useless plants. Such is the mission of the 

 various sparrows, snowbirds, finches and 

 longspurs which often occupy our fields 

 in flocks of thousands during the winter 

 months. 



If, after ascertaining such truths as the 

 above regarding birds, we continue to 

 slaughter them, it is not due to thought- 

 lessness on our part. We do it wilfully and 

 maliciously. The schoolboy may thought- 

 lessly rob a bird's nest or kill a bird or 2. 

 It is the duty of teacher and parent alike 

 to teach him better, to show him how 

 wrong it is to destroy life uselessly. It is 

 especially their duty to prevent the de- 

 struction of birds. If each schoolboy in 

 Nebraska were to rob a nest of, say, 5 

 bird's eggs, what would be the result? 

 Yet the making of bird-egg collections is 

 getting to be such a fad that almost 

 every boy enters into it more or less zeal- 

 ously at some time or other. Some single 

 collectors in a single season take 500 or 

 more eggs. This should be stopped. We 

 can study birds and their nests without 

 destroying either. A live bird is more in- 

 teresting than a dead one. An egg left in 

 a nest where it will in due time become a 

 live creature is of more interest than an 

 empty eggshell. 



We, as citizens of the United States, 

 pride ourselves on being highly civilized 

 and humane. We also claim to be intense- 

 ly" practical and businesslike in everything. 

 Are we? 



THE CAPACITY OF A KING. 



In February, 1898, number of Recrea- 

 tion I read with interest W. H. Gaddis's 

 snake and rat story. Twenty-five years 

 ago, while constructing the Santa Fe 

 canal, I made collections of reptiles for the 

 Smithsonian Institution and private par- 

 ties. Mr. Gaddis's account of the swal- 

 lowing capacity of snakes reminded me 

 of something I once saw. I had 2 boxes 

 made with glass on one side and wire 

 screens on the other. I put one of these 

 boxes on top of the other, with a hole in 

 the middle of them, and a post in the 

 lower box so snakes could pass up and 

 down. In these boxes I had 2 snakes that 

 were called at that time corral snakes. 

 They are now known as the deadly poison 

 American cobra. Each was about 2 feet 

 long. I also ^had one blow adder, or, as 

 we know him here, 'possum snake. He 

 was about 2 feet long; and there was a 

 rusty, stub-tail water snake 3J/2 feet long. 

 One morning I picked up a 5-foot king 



snake, carried him into the house and put 

 him in the lower box, where the rest were. 

 Before he had half of his length in the 

 box he had one of the cobras by the tail. 

 All of the snakes were hustling to gain the 

 upper box. They swarmed up, but the 

 little cobra got 3 turns around the post 

 before the king had him taut. Then came 

 the tug. The cobra strained to get turns, 

 or coils, on the post, and the king grad- 

 ually swallowed him. Before the king 

 closed up to the post the cobra had gained 

 2 more coils around the post, making 5, 

 or about half his length. The king's nose 

 was up to the post, where he pulled until he 

 broke the cobra's skin and tore it off near- 

 ly around his body. This hurt so the little 

 fellow let go 3 turns and struck the king 

 several times. The king kept on pulling 

 and swallowing until he pulled off the last 

 coil, when the cobra hooked about 2 inches 

 of himself on one side of the king's mouth, 

 and thus stopped progress for quite a 

 while. At last the king got a purchase 

 against the post and pulled back, getting 

 about an inch more of the cobra out of 

 sight. Then he rubbed him against the 

 wire screen until he absorbed him. In 5 

 minutes the king snake was up above and 

 had the blow adder by the head, partially 

 swallowed him and backed down, finishing 

 him below. A call to dinner took us away. 

 When we returned, about 8 o'clock, the 

 king was in the upper box with the other 

 cobra about half swallowed, and the water 

 snake was in the lower box, coiled up in 

 one corner. At dark that night there were 

 2 snakes, the king in the upper box and 

 the water snake below. At 5 a. m. I had 

 only a good sized king snake, coiled up 

 in the lower box. I have seen snakes gob- 

 ble almost any small thing, even a turtle 

 shell as large as a silver dollar, and I 

 never saw but one try more than he could 

 accomplish. That was a water snake with 

 a bream, head first. The bream was at least 

 4 inches wide, and the snake was not more 

 than 2 feet long. He lay under water, in 

 plain sight, on a sandy bottom, nearly 24 

 hours, trying his best, but could get no 

 farther up than the eyes of the fish. 



D. C. Barker, Sanford, Fla. 



MIGRATIONS OF THE PURPLE MARTIN. 



C. C. HASKINS. 



This year one of Chicago's North Side 

 parks was chosen by the purple martins of 

 the vicinity as a rendezous prior to their 

 annual migration. This curious custom of 

 the bird, Progne purpurea, is interesting. 

 For several days before their final de- 

 parture they congregate in one flock in 

 some selected spot, and will not be driven 

 away. They roost together, scatter dur- 

 ing the day, but return at evening for sev- 

 eral days in succession, until the day of de- 



