Animal Greed It is, I suppose, the peculiar fondness of
birds for the pips of' the apple that makes the apple seedling so very rare an occurrence in most of our orchards. Where apple pulp ,is thrown out in heaps from cider factories greenfinches will assemble on occasion in scarcely credible numbers and so gorge themselves on the pips that they die of a surfeit, like King Henry with the lampreys—and this fact is not apocryphal. The evidence on the subject from one cider factory, at any rate, is quite beyond dispute. I have recorded the filet before and have since had further evidence. In spite of the tags of the moralists a great many animals do not know when they have had enough. Sheep will kill themselves (as Thomas Hardy quite accurately describes) from an excessive meal of clover ; and I saw the other day two cows withdrawn from the meadow to the stall because they were likely to die of excessive eating.
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