That these large kinds thrive so well with us is an encouraging fact; but the question that concerns us at present is the feasibility of importing birds of the grove, chiefly of the passerine order, and sending them forth to give a greater variety and richness to our bird life. To go with such an object to tropical countries would only be to court failure. Nature's highest types, surpassing all others in exquisite beauty of form, brilliant colouring, and perfect melody, can never be known to our woods and groves. These rarest avian gems may not be removed from their setting, and to those who desire to know them in their unimaginable lustre, it will always be necessary to cross oceans and penetrate into remote wildernesses. We must go rather to regions where the conditions of life are hard, where winters are long and often severe, where Nature is not generous in the matter of food, and the mouths are many, and the competition great. Nor even from such regions could we take any strictly migratory species with any prospect of success. Still, limiting ourselves to the resident, and consequently to the hardiest kinds, and to those possessing only a partial migration, it is surprising to find how many there are to choose from, how many are charming melodists, and how many have the bright tints in which our native species are so sadly lacking. The field from which the supply can be drawn is very extensive, and includes the continent of Europe, the countries of North Asia, a large portion of North America and Antarctic America, or South Chili and Patagonia. It would not be going too far to say that for every English species, inhabiting the garden, wood, field, stream, or waste, at least half a dozen resident species, with similar habits, might be obtained from the countries mentioned which would be superior to our own in melody (the nightingale and lark excepted), bright plumage, grace of form, or some other attractive quality. The question then arises; What reason is there for believing that these exotics, imported necessarily in small numbers, would succeed in winning a footing in our country, and become a permanent addition to its avifauna? For it has been admitted that our species are not few, in spite of the losses that have been suffered, and that the bird population does not diminish, however much its character may have altered and deteriorated from the aesthetic point of view, and probably also from the utilitarian. There are no vacant places. Thus, the streams are fished by herons, grebes, and kingfishers, while the rushy margins are worked by coots and gallinules, and, above the surface, reed and sedge-warblers, with other kinds, inhabit the reed-beds. The decaying forest tree is the province of the woodpecker, of which there are three kinds; and the trunks and branches of all trees, healthy or decaying, are quartered by the small creeper, that leaves no crevice unexplored in its search for minute insects and their eggs.