10 Teo UE sae U.D Us BeOENur BU. 1 ie ie alee 
Murder of the Innocents 
By E. T. BARoopy 
ONE SUNDAY morning in the month of December, 1940, I went to the 
Northwestern station in Chicago to meet my daughter who was coming 
home for a short visit. While waiting for her train to arrive, the new 
Streamliner, City of Denver, arrived at the station. As the train stopped 
I began to notice bird wings and heads attached to its sides and especially 
the front part of the engine, which is made like the front of an automobile, 
with grillwork. Upon further investigation I discovered scores of bird 
bodies, heads, and mangled legs frozen to the front of the train. I stepped 
forward and carefully examined many of the remains, and to my horror 
found them to be bodies and remains of western meadowlarks. Very few 
of the bodies were intact. In the grill of the engine I found remains of 
many wings and tails, and inside the grill there were several bodies that 
I could not reach. On one side of the engine I found several bodies frozen 
to the body of the car with their heads crushed and their entrails held 
tight to the steel frame of the locomotive. 
In talking with the men who work at the station I was told by one of 
them that it was a daily sight at certain times of the year. It so happened, 
he informed me, that on the day I was there the number of dead birds 
was very limited in quantity. 
I picked up several of the bodies to determine whether the species 
killed in this manner vary or are the same. I found that all the birds I 
picked up were of the same family. Evidently these birds light on the 
tracks, are frightened by the whistle of the engine, and when they fly 
are sucked in by the locomotive, which in some of the sections of the west 
travels at 70 to 80 and more miles per hour. 
Berwyn, Illinois. 
ft ft ft 
Do Wild Birds Recognize People? 
By CONSTANCE NICE 
A PAIR of robins that I studied at the University of Michigan Biological 
Station certainly did. Their nest was in a tree in front of my cabin on 
the main street of the camp. The study involved removing the young from 
the nest once a day to weigh and measure them. 
Each day the parents became, if possible, more indignant and appre- 
hensive every time I saw them, until I wondered how they could stand 
hundreds of people passing beneath their tree every day. However, a 
fellow student who was watching a pair of goldfinches next door told me 
that, although the robins crossed the road shrieking to meet me when I 
approached, they ignored other passers-by. No matter what costume I 
wore, they recognized me immediately and screamed indignantly whenever 
I approached or left my cabin. 
Chicago, Illinois. 
