VI 
PREFACE. 
The Sparrows here have driven off nearly all onr insectivorous 
birds, which of course are small, and have generally soft bills 
and a timid nature ; but the Sparrow will eat nothing but seeds, 
while seeds are available. When there are no seeds they will 
eat fruit,—when there are no seeds or fruit they will condescend 
to kitchen vegetables (or zonal pelargoniums); but if none of the 
foregoing are to be had, and the dog, the pig, and the cows 
cannot be robbed, the Sparrow will stay his hunger with Aphides 
or soft grubs and caterpillars.” 
It is said (and rightly, if we could have it) that we should 
keep up the natural balance, but it is not possible in all cases to 
secure this. We are not in a natural but a civilized state, and, 
as civilization makes it necessary to destroy a large amount of 
birds of prey, and likewise to keep the idle lads of our country 
parishes from trespassing and killing all they come across at 
haphazard, it is needful that we should in some cases have a 
counterbalance ,—a legal and economic, rather than a natural, 
balance. 
There is no difficulty in doing what is requisite quietly and in 
due order, and relatively to this being done even in the fence 
months, so far as birds not included in the schedule of the Bird 
Protection Act, 1880, and Larks, are concerned, without any 
infringement of the law, or even the slightest expression of 
approval of illegal proceeding, I give the following reply, 
received by me from Mr. Gaskell:—“As regards the Act pro¬ 
hibiting the destruction of Wild Birds after the 1st of March, it 
appears that if an owner or occupier of land gives authority to 
persons to kill Sparrows or any wild bird not included in the 
schedule it is lawful and just, and we, the members of the Wirral 
Farmers’ Club, give that authority.” 
I have not received from any quarter a single trustworthy 
observation of Sparrows feeding regularly on insects; nobody 
doubts that they can and do sometimes take them, in special 
circumstances ; and it may be that, in the words of one of our 
well-known naturalists, “ The Sparrow, like other creatures, 
adapts itself to circumstances, and in towns where it cannot 
procure grain it lives on a great variety of food, and destroys a 
great number of Aphides of various kinds and Cockchafers.” 
These circumstances, however, are exceptional, and do not 
bear on our flocks and coveys of Sparrows demolishing the 
harvest; the harm is before our eyes. I can bear witness to it 
