have seen such pretty contrivances, and have said to myself, "The boy
who made this is skilful, and may come to be a good builder, or other
artisan, some day;" but when I see bird's eggshells hung up, I turn away
with a feeling of pain, because I know that somebody must be there,
either idle and cruel, or encouraging their children to be so.

[Illustration]

But there is something far worse than this. When the mother bird has
made her nest, and sat long days and nights on her eggs, and heard the
little ones chirp within, and helped them to break the thin shell, and
felt their little warm bodies cuddling themselves among her soft
feathers, and seen their yellow beaks open to ask her for the food that
it gives such joy to her affectionate heart to put into them; oh, THEN,
can you turn all her honest happiness into misery and mourning, and kill
those baby-birds with a miserable death, by cold and hunger, if not by
other tortures. If ever you have done this, pray to the Lord God to
forgive your sin, for Jesus Christ's sake. Do you think He will forgive
you? Yes, you say, because he is very merciful. Indeed he is and for
that very reason he hates cruelty: but while you look to the Lord's
mercy for pardon, you must steadily resolve to offend no more by doing
what he hates; else you only mock him.

I do not myself understand how anybody can bear to hurt little birds,
they are such endearing creatures; but I have seen it with my own eyes,
and am obliged to believe it. Bad example will go a great way. Boys, and
men too, will do what they see others do, without stopping to think of
the great truth that God sees them too. But, then, good example goes
far also; and the person who is careful not to do wrong has the comfort
of knowing that he is showing others the right way. While I write this