BIRDS AND POETRY. 
427 
With birds it is different, however. Man counts but 
few of them among his enemies, and never pursues them 
—that is, a true and noble-minded man—with that 
animosity which he shows when crushing under his heel 
the head of the adder, or following the wolf to the death. 
The predatory Eagle, even, though at feud with the 
weakest members of man’s flocks and herds, is killed in 
fair fight; it is no war of extermination. The joyous 
huntsman, his trusty rifle in hand, advances to the 
attack, and lays in wait for the enemy, his heart and 
soul in the sport: a bullet ends the Eagle’s career;—no 
common trap, cudgel, or poisoned bait. 
The generous-hearted man is, and ever has been, a 
friend—yes, a true friend—to birds, though occasionally 
indulging in the chase of the same. He is bound to 
these lovely creatures by ties which are never loosed, but 
rather, on the contrary, strengthened every day. The 
good-will he bears them is an inheritance of ancient 
days; for long before the naturalist began to watch and 
observe his feathered favourites, the poet did the same, 
as also did the man of common sense. All looked on 
birds with the simple-minded glance, one may say, of a 
child, and, charmed and attracted by its grace and the 
beauty of its plumage, flew with the bonny creature, in 
spirit, over hill and dale, by land and sea: the poet 
addressed sonnets to it, which are the reflections of its 
own inmost melody, showed it hospitality, took it into 
the house, or sought to catch the truant, enticed by the 
summer breezes, with net and snare, thus taming and 
attaching the feathered beauty to himself. In this way 
arose the bond of friendship, which exists in full force 
at the present day, between man and birds. 
The most indifferent person cannot deny that the form 
