BY THE WAYSIDE 
11 
know what that means. We have a 
fight on to save the beauty of Niagara. 
We have been compelled to appeal to 
congress. What the result will be I 
would not presume to prophesy, because 
attempting to forecast congressional act¬ 
ion is as uncertain as betting on an elec¬ 
tion. But we have confronting us a well 
organized attempt of commercial inter¬ 
ests to desecrate the grandest of nature’s 
works in America. It should serve as a 
warning to all other portions of the 
country that we have been compelled to 
appeal to congress at a time when it is 
all but too late to save any of the beauty of 
the falls. 
“It certainlv would be too bad if com- 
•/ 
mercial efforts should be permitted to 
desecrate the only beauty spot, the only 
piece of scenery between the Alleghany 
and the Rocky mountains. I am in no 
position to say what will be the result of 
the erection of the power dams at Kil- 
bourn and Portage. But in the light ol 
the experience with Niagara T am in a 
position to say to you and the people of 
Wisconsin that you should take steps 
immediatelv to find out what the effect 
will be. They should not wait until 
after the damage has been done, and the 
desecrators have hidden behind the bul¬ 
wark of ‘vested rights.’”—Milwaukee 
Free Press., Feb. 16, 1906. 
SaVe the Robin. 
Many people of the North are probably 
unaware of the fact that in the Southern 
States, where Robin Redbreast spends 
the winter, he is regarded as a game bird 
and is persistently shot both for recreation 
and for the market. 
By far the greatest destruction of robins 
occurs at night when the birds in immense 
numbers assemble to roost, flying in from 
all directions as the evening gathers. 
The roost is in some favored growth of 
cedar trees or small pines, and is gener¬ 
ally used throughout the season. So 
closely do the birds sit on their perches 
that a single discharge of a gun will often 
bring down twenty or thirty victims. 
However, the negro or average country 
boy does not need a gun in order to kill 
all the robins he may want. These 
hunters usually go in pairs, and after 
one, who carries a torch, has climbed 
into a tree, his companion disturbs the 
boughs of the neighboring trees with a 
pole or by means of a club. The fright¬ 
ened birds dart toward the light, and the 
torch-bearer, seizing them as they flutter 
about the flame or alight near by, 
crushes their heads and drops them to 
the ground. Sometimes a second man 
climbs the tree and with a brush strikes 
down the terrified birds. Frequently 7 a 
dozen or twenty lights may 7 be counted 
about a robin roost in a night, and the 
number of birds slain on such occasions 
aggregate into the thousands. 
The National Association of Audubon 
Societies (Incorporated), which has al¬ 
ready 7 done so much to cultivate a better 
sentiment for bird and game protection 
in the United States, has intelligently 
taken up this matter.—Audubon Leaflet. 
“To add to the resources of one’s life. 
—Think how much that means! To add 
to those things that make us more at 
home in the world; that help gaurd us 
against ennui and stagnation; that in¬ 
vest the country with new interest and 
enticement; that make every walk in the 
fields or woods an excursion into a land 
of unexhausted treasures; that make the 
returning seasons fill us with expecta-, 
tion and delight; that make every rod of 
ground like the page of a book in which 
new and strange things may be read; in 
short those things that help keep us 
fresh and sane and young, and make us 
immune to the strife and fever of the 
world.”—John Burroughs. 
