The native swallows destroy an amount of noxious insects beyond calculation, and almost beyond imagination. Without birds this world would, because of insects, be uninhabitable, yet each year two hundred millions of them are sacrificed _for women’s hats and bonnets_. Aside from the inexcusable barbarity of this practice is its menace to our trees, our crops, and our very existence. CHAPTER VII. A BOY’S BACK-YARD WORKSHOP. How to make Buildings Plumb and Level. By a workshop is meant a place where a boy can build a boat, sled, box-kite, man-kite,[8] mend a golf-club, a broken bicycle, his mother’s rocking-chair, his aunt’s umbrella, or build a paper-balloon.[9] It is a room, house, or shed, where a boy can do what pleases him, without being in everybody’s way; a place where he can retire and idly whittle a stick, or seriously work out some youthful invention; a place where he can entertain his young friends during the rainy or stormy days of winter, and where they can talk over the new football team, baseball or golf club, without being oppressed with the knowledge that their loud talk is annoying the older folks. The late war has demonstrated to the whole world the wonderful skill and pluck of the young American, and the world must not suppose these qualities to be suddenly acquired, but must know them to be a matter of education--an education acquired during boyhood, at the boy’s own school, with boy professors. The Success of Americans is not on account of any peculiarity of the blood which flows in their veins, but because they live under a government which teaches independence, and the boys on the play-ground become self-reliant, resourceful lads, developing their skill by building kites, sleds, and boats, and developing their pluck on the baseball and football field. To such youths it is unnecessary to enumerate the advantages of a workshop; neither is it essential to point out to them the fact that they may commence their collection of tools with a serviceable pocket-knife. A Good Oil-stone, to keep the knife sharp, is a prize, and for its protection from dust or injury it should be set into a block of wood so that about one-eighth of an inch of the stone projects above the block. A similar block, with a space the size of the stone and one-eighth of an inch deep cut out of its centre, should be made for a cover. A Hatchet is not a difficult thing to procure, and a saw, a screw-driver, a gimlet, and a three-cornered file can be added to the collection as opportunity offers. Next a chisel or two, and you will have a kit of tools with which, if skilfully used, you can build anything from a three-legged stool to a flying-machine. Use the Best Tools You Can Get. With an axe or hatchet, an auger and a sheath-knife, the whole race of pioneers, including Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, and the parents of Abraham Lincoln, built their homes and made their household furniture.