The birds that go easiest and farthest in training are the parrots, macaws and cockatoos.
The most beautiful bird species of the world are about fifty in number; and only a few of them are found among the birds of paradise.
The minds of wild birds are quite as varied and diversified as are the forms and habits of the different orders and genera. XVI
THE WISDOM OF THE SERPENT
OF all the vertebrates, the serpents live under the greatest handicaps. They are hated and destroyed by all men, they can neither run nor fly far away, and they subsist under maximum difficulties. Those of the temperate zone are ill fitted to withstand the rigors of winter.
And yet the serpents survive; and we have not heard of any species having become extinct during our own times.
It is indeed worth while to "consider the wisdom of the serpent." Without the exercise of keen intelligence all the snakes of the cultivated lands of the world long ago would have been exterminated. The success of serpents of all species in meeting new conditions and maintaining their existence in the face of enormous difficulties compels us, as reasoning beings, to accord to them keen intelligence and ratiocination.
The poisonous serpents afford a striking illustration of reason and folly en masse. The total number of venomous species is really great, and their distribution embraces practically the whole of the torrid and temperate zones. They are too numerous for mention here; and their capacity for mischief to man is very great. Our own country has at least eighteen species of poisonous snakes, including the rattlesnakes, the copperhead, moccasin, and coral snakes. All these, however, are remarkably pacific. Without exception they are non-aggressive, and they attack only when they think they are exposed to danger, and must defend themselves or die. Hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of our people have tramped through the woods and slept in the sage-brush and creosote bushes of the rattlesnake, and waded through swamps full of moccasins, with never a bite. In America only about two persons per year are bitten by wild rattlesnakes.
Our snakes, and all but a very few of the other poison-snake species of the world, know that it pays to keep the peace. Now, what if all snakes were as foolishly aggressive as the hooded and spectacled cobras of India? Let us see.
Those cobra species are man-haters. They love to attack and do damage. They go out of their way to bite people. They crawl into huts and bungalows, especially during the monsoon rains, and they infest thatch roofs. But are they wise, and retiring, like the house-haunting gopher snake of the South?