DESTRUCTION OF WILD BIRDS' EGGS 7 



authenticated specimens stowed away in ill -arranged boxes, 

 totally regardless of order, species, or locality, and is useless 

 to himself and of no interest to science. 



The Greedy Collector should be restrained. He should 

 be satisfied, as a rule, with one clutch of eggs of each bird, 

 with an occasional addition of an abnormal clutch or egg for 

 the sake of comparison. 



The Mercenary Collector should be abolished. He it is 

 who is mainly responsible for the extermination of species 

 and waste of eggs. His collection is the result of gold, 

 changed into silver and copper as it filters through the hands 

 of dealers, gamekeepers, shepherds, herd-boys, and others, 

 who, often in direct disobedience of orders from their em- 

 ployers, have robbed many an important eyrie, and with 

 indiscriminating ignorance have swept some of our bird 

 nurseries bare. The size and value of this collector's store 

 depends upon the length of his purse, and while proud to 

 tell the market value of a particular egg, he may be unable 

 to describe the bird that laid it, or the nest in which it was 

 found. 



The True Collector should be a Naturalist, acquainting 

 himself with birds, their habits, flight, migration, language, 

 and breeding haunts ; his egg-collecting being only one of 

 the means of acquiring this knowledge. He should collect 

 for himself, and should never receive an egg into his cabinet 

 unless authenticated by an individual in whom he can im- 

 plicitly trust. To him, therefore, no dealer need apply, and 

 under these conditions egg-collecting has all the excitement 

 of sport, and the final acquisition of a rare egg, after perhaps 

 years of waiting and watching, is a triumph, and the egg 

 itself is a trophy of which the possessor is justly proud. 

 The collection, whether large or small, should be perfect as 

 far as it goes, all eggs being arranged according to order, 

 genus, and species. Every specimen should be marked 

 with a number and registered with a corresponding mark 

 in a book kept for the purpose, in which should also be 

 recorded the date, locality, and authority, and any note of 

 interest taken at the time. The chief aim should be accu- 

 racy ; and the journal, if properly kept, is a mine of useful 

 information. It and the cabinet are inseparable, and the 



