78 
BY THE WAYSIDE 
Michigan Prize Letter 
Jackson, Mich., March 1, 1911. 
Dear Wayside :— 
During the winter I have seen several 
sapsuckers, and doves were very plenti¬ 
ful, hut the only robin I saw was on 
the twentieth of February. 
During January a pair of bluejays 
came to our yard in search of food. I 
put up a cigar box where I had seen 
them perch and the next day one of them 
took away a large piece of bread and 
flew to the next apple tree to eat it. They 
would also peck at the suet I had put up. 
One morning while going to school 
T heard a hammering overhead and look¬ 
ing up, saw a little downy woodpecker 
hopping along a dead branch in search of 
insects. I got very close to him before 
he flew away. I saw him in the same 
tree while coming home from school. 
About five o’clock in the afternoon 
great flocks of crows would go over to 
the cemetery to roost in the evergreen 
trees. They would wake us up about 
six o’clock in the morning with their 
cawing. 
Yours truly, 
Corden Knowles. 
Age 13 years. 
Continued from Page 75. 
out and slaughtered in the cowardly, 
cold-blooded manner by a lot of human 
swine who seem to look for an oppor¬ 
tunity to take a life. Birds of all kinds 
will be shot from their nests and the eggs 
left to their own fate, probably to de¬ 
cay and the young to die from starvation. 
Birds will be roused from their breed¬ 
ing places and a rearing of the young 
birds prevented. The ultimate result 
will be, that the birds are forced to seek 
the breeding grounds ot other states 
where the feathered tribe is allowed to 
propagate in peace. 
We can not afiford to lose the birds. 
We want them because of their beauty, 
them song and economic value to man. 
Naturalists are generally agreed that the 
birds of this country save the United 
States annually a sum of $200,000,000 
because of their incessant prey upon 
noxious weeds, injurious insects and 
mammals. Therefore, it be wise that we 
spare the living and those that are to be. 
“It is due the barbarous recreation of 
the sportsman and the hunter’s greed 
for gain, more than to any other causes, 
that our forests and plains are being 
steadily robbed O'f their most interesting 
and valuable forms of wild life, the 
birds; and that the few which still sur¬ 
vive have learned to fear all mankind.” 
—Hattie Washburn, Shields' Magazine, 
Dec., 1909. 
And how should we interpret these 
great words of the Good Book? 
“Let Us make man in Our Tmage, 
after Our Likeness ; and let them have 
dominion over the fish of the sea, and 
over the birds of the heavens, and over 
the cattle, and over all the earth.” 
Surely this passage does not mean that 
man should “hold dominion” with a 
power that will’ bring chaos and dearth 
to the living creatures upon the earth. 
Man should see in these living objects 
sources for the maintenance of life, 
should regard them as emblems of the 
beautiful, of good cheer and of friend¬ 
ship. And be it known, forevermore, 
that “we have no right, either legal or 
moral, to destroy the wild life now on 
this earth or to permit it to be destroyed. 
We are its guardians and trustees; and 
the men of the future will hold us ac¬ 
countable for the manner in which we 
guard their inheritance, and transmit it 
to them.” 
