The Forrest City times., 1899-06-09
SPARE THE BIRDS.

Il out or the SCDOOl room TUT HIS ouhi mer vacation. Young America must be on the move, 'doing some thing good, bad or indifferent preferably good. if 1t is as conven- tent as the indifferent or the baN but something at all events. Young America must play ball, fish, swim, chase rabbits, fight logs. Young America brings all forms of sports and amusenents to his feet and makes slaves of them. With slung-shot, rife, bow and ar rows, shot guns and other weapons of slaughter, Young Amerlca makes var on the feathery songs,ers al the grove. To slay thieving blue jay makes young America feel that he has brought low highwayman. To bring down . "peckerwood" lsI q triumph. The thrush, the little wren, the swallow twittering round tho s;raw-built she'd" the blue bird, the flaming red birds and the sparrow, all fall victims to the shafts and missiles of Young Amer ica. The kiliingis not indulged in for pure wantonness, but for pure excitement. flor the fun of seeing
 em drop," as the border despera- does of Texas used to say when ex blaming why they shot down Mex eaus. Young American Las little sentiment. and he IS not moved by the futtering victime of his pleas ure. He has very well developed contempt for Audubon societies, and he claims the right to kill birds because he can kill them, and to rob birds nests because he is in- tensely human and loves to appro- tpriate and destroy.
 But the birds should be spared. They are of value. The meanest of them have their uses in the economy of nature. They protect the trees by devouring those in- sects that bore into them and rem der them porus, so that water per colates ard poisons and rots the forest monarchs. In this respect the birds have real commercial value.
 But this is not their onlyfvalue. They are natures choirsters, sur pliced in richly colored garments of curious dyes and making the air vocal with sweetest melodies. No one writes music for them, or teach es them to sing, and they have no Instrumental accompanlments, but their music is inimitable and the greatest artists can only clumsily copy them.
 This world would be a sad one indeed without the birds. There are places in it now where no bird is ever heard, and if any boy could spend day or week in such pla- ces he would long for the birds aL d never to kill another. In those vast sweeps of forest lowlands con- tiguous to the lower Mississippi which are covered with many feet ot water during overfows, or far on the sun-shimmered alkali plains of the West, there are no signs of animal life. In one instance water drives the squirrels, deer, turkey bears and all birds to the high lands; in the other instance lack of water compels all animals to flee to where they can find verdure and nourishment. Nature has her lsports and contradictions just as
 well as boys, and this is one of them. In these wastes of desola. ftion no boy would care to remain
 because of the oppressiveness oi Esilence. People become startled nat their own voices. Tn these
 places silence does not mean what It means selsewh ere-the mere ab
 sence of sound. Here the silence
 IS roar filled with strange and
 uncanny voices-Aa roar so loud
 that it synthesizes, absorbs and
 drowns all other sounds. It is a
 terrible roar which tnaddens peep lo
 who are forced 10 listen 10 1t.
 People cannot tolerate the roar of
 silence. They must havearticulated d sounds. Prisoners in subterra.
 mean cells would become insane
 were it not that sometimes they can hear the tramp of men or oi
 horses on the pavements above
 them. Sound is necessary; as necessary as food or air. There are many beautiful sounds, "the falling of many waters" the human Ivoice, the notes of grand cathe. l dral organ, the realiDg of bells, the moaning of winds, or the sobbing of rain; but there is no sound so sweet as the song of birds. and the boys who klll these musical visi
 tants destroy that which is indis pensable and which is of incompar. able beauty. Spare the birds.- Commercial Appeal.