STATE HORTICULTUKAL SOCIETY. 109 



Let us take this matter in hand now and intercept these 

 maurauders. Let us petition our legislature to enact laws that will 

 secure these birds from the certain destruction that is impending. 

 Let these petitions be signed by every fruit-grower and farmer in the 

 State, and our law makers will not dare to disregard them. Unless 

 we are vigilant and active in this matter our feathered allies will be 

 exterminated before our eyes b}^ irresponsible pot hunters and super- 

 cillious nabobs, who will enter our fields, trample down our crops, 

 recklessly shoot among our stock, disturb the quiet of the Sabbath, 

 and insolently scoff at our futile protests. Prairie chickens, quails 

 and meadow larks are regarded as legitimate spoil by these free- 

 booters, and these are among the best allies of the fruit grower and 

 farmer. The number of grasshoppers, crickets, cut- worms and other 

 noxious insects that they annually destroy is beyond computation. 

 We need them, therefore let us preserve them. Let this Society 

 earnestly take this matter in hand at this meeting, and protect these 

 birds from the disreputable shot-gun tramps, who are preparing to 

 destroy them by wholesale as soon as the present law expires. Let 

 it pass emphatic resolutions to that effect, and appeal to every fruit 

 grower and farmer in the State to lend their aid in defeating the 

 rapacious designs of the aristocratic and insolent sportsmen's clubs 

 of our cities. 



