A white or a pied bird, whether rook, blackbird, starling, finch, or sparrow, never fails to hold the eye, and may become a character of public interest in a neighbourhood. Its usual fate is to be shot--the fate of any rare wild creature. The sportsman sees no special reason for sparing a pied pheasant that has come to his coverts--he shoots it at the first chance for the sake of the few seconds' pleasure given by the curious plumage before it is tossed with the rest on the game-cart. But the keeper silently mourns for the death of the pied bird. If he voices his lament, he receives a stock answer: "Well, it is too late now." Happy the keeper who succeeds in catching up a bird that he treasures, so that he may give it safe shelter until the rattle of guns is silenced. * * * * * Colour-Changes in Feathers "Once a pied bird always a pied bird" is the expression of a common fallacy. A pheasant may be almost white for months, then change colour, and become hardly different from other birds. A pied bird tends to become more pied as the time of moulting approaches. A homely illustration of this increasing lightness of colour is seen when a black cat is about to change its coat; then the fur turns a rusty brown. When this is shed the new growth seems blacker than ever. A black cat or dog with white marks nearly always has young with similar markings. And if you have a white or pied hen pheasant, in spite of the fact that after a moult her new feathers may come of the ordinary brown shade, you may expect, perhaps, half the chicks from her eggs to wear their mother's pretty white or pied dress. Birds that have been pied in their youth, then have put on sober apparel, again put on the showy shade of feathers in their old age, though it is a lucky pheasant that reaches anything like old age, whether pied or not. * * * * * Nature's Healing