WHAT DO we mean by a "natural right?" Are there rights of any other sort in the world? Yes, a legal right may not always be a natural right. On the contrary, a legal right is sometimes a natural wrong. In many states it has, at one time or another, been legally right to slaughter the hawks and owls, which are far more useful than harmful. The birds had a clear title to the natural right of life, which the laws denied until the lawmakers discovered their mistake. Long ago our forefathers declared that all men possess the natural right to "Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." Certainly no one will deny that any creature has a right to life so long as in its life it contributes more toward the welfare of the world than in its death. It also has a right to liberty so long as it can do more good at liberty than as a captive. Granting that the lower animals are capable of happiness, no one, would think of denying them the right of the pursuit of their happiness except for some higher good. Without discussing these general principles further let us see how they will apply to the birds as natural rights.

Has the bird a right to live? According to our first principle he has if he is more useful alive than dead. What, then, does he do that can be called really useful? If he is a diver, a gull, a tern, or any one of the really seafaring birds, he eats fish, water insects, offal and whatever small animals resort to the water, doing little or no harm and a great deal of good. Near large sea-coast cities the gulls dispose of the garbage which is taken out a distance from shore and dumped into the ocean, and so prevent its drifting back upon the beach. If he is a duck, goose or swan, he feeds upon fish, the plants which grow in the water and at its margins, upon the insects and worms which inhabit the ooze at the bottom, and sometimes upon grains in the fields and about the marshes. He does a great deal of good and rarely any harm. If he is a heron, crane, rail, coot or gallinule, his food is frogs, snakes, insects and worms, and so he is useful. If he is a snipe, sandpiper or plover, he destroys large numbers of insects, worms and such small animals as are to be found in wet places, and is always a very useful help to the farmer.

If he is a bird of the fowl kind or a pigeon, he eats grain mostly, but also many insects. He may sometimes do a little damage to the ripe grain, but he usually gathers that which has gone to waste. If he is a vulture, hawk, eagle or owl, he destroys great quantities of animals that are harmful to man, not often visiting the poultry yard, and so does great good. If he is a kingfisher he eats small fish mostly, and so is not harmful. Among all the remaining birds there are but a few which do not feed almost entirely upon insects or other creatures which menace vegetation. Even these seed eaters feed the young upon insects and worms, and do good by destroying vast quantities of injurious plants. Those which eat ripe fruit pay for what they eat by scattering broadcast the seeds of the fruit. When there is no ripe fruit they eat insects and worms. The crows and blackbirds and bobolink are rather overly fond of green corn and ripe grains in the fall of the year, but they pay for what they eat by destroying immense quantities of insects and worms in the spring. When the whole life of the bird is taken into account we cannot escape the fact that the bird has a natural right to life on account of the good he does.

How does the value of the birds body used for food compare with the good the bird would do if allowed to live? Reckoned in dollars and cents the flesh on an average birds body would be worth, say twenty-five cents at the price of good beef. But let us say seventy-five cents to do full justice to the greater excellence of the birds flesh as food. We must consider, however, that the most of the birds which are not good for food, civilized food, are among our largest birds. The size of the average edible bird would therefore be greatly reduced, so our estimate is a very liberal one. But during the average lifetime of the average bird it would destroy many times its own weight of injurious animals. Careful investigations have shown that these injurious animals would do many times more damage than the worth of the birds flesh. We have no need, then, to take into account the real good we derive in the pleasure which the beautiful plumage, the sweet voice and the graceful form bring to us. That is an added value which nothing can compensate for.