Owing to their singularly perfect protection against the cold, and also perhaps to the quickness of their wits, birds are more readily transferable from one clime to another than are any other animals. The feathered tenants of our barnyards are, except perhaps the aquatic species and the turkey, all from the tropical realm. Experiments with various other wild forms go to show that there are very many other tropical species which will prove to have an equal tolerance of high latitudes. If this be true we may fairly look to the domestication of the varied bird life of the equatorial regions for the enrichment of our northern lands. Even when it may not be desirable to bring these species to the state of complete subjugation they may be introduced on something like the terms which have been given and accepted in the case of the so-called English pheasant, which has brought to the high north of Britain and some parts of this country an element of grace which is afforded by no indigenous form of North America or Europe. There are hundreds of beautiful tropical species which await reconciliation with men; they have that quality of sympathy which affords the natural foundations for the contract, but this has in no case been availed of except when the creatures, in addition to their aesthetic charm, have possessed some economic value. There as elsewhere in the matter of domestication the commercial motive has controlled our action. In forming our societies as we are in time to do, account must be taken of the sympathetic value of its elements, reckoning among these the animals which the system brings in contact with men. Much of the culture which has served to lift our race above its ancient savagery has been derived from the influence of domesticated animals; in proportion as these creatures have sympathetically responded to our care we have been thereby educated and our spiritual development advanced. So far as in our further choice of animals which are to be associated with ourselves we are guided by a desire to extend this work, we may well turn our attention towards the birds, for in that group we may find a greater number of species which have attained the physical beauty which attracts and the mental qualities which may endear them to mankind. They can give us nothing that can ever come so close to us as the dog--the unique gift of the wilderness--but they may afford a host of forms to enrich our lives.