370 THE GARDENER. [Aug. 



prietors and gardeners most, declare there is not a word of truth in 

 the statement. Changes do take phice, as usual, and no doubt reduc- 

 tions of a nature have had to be made in numbers of gardens that 

 rendered it desirable to gardeners interested in their business to 

 resign their charge ; but, as a rule, employers are too much alive to 

 their own interests, and, to do them justice, generally too considerate, 

 to part with good servants for the sake of a few pounds' difference in 

 their salary, knowing as well as other people that economy is not 

 efifected by such measures. 



So much abuse has been heaped upon gardeners and farmers for 

 their hostility to certain species of birds — which they believe destroy 

 or greatly injure their crops — by those who have taken the "balance 

 of life" in hand, and who maintain that the birds are really the 

 cultivator's friends, that it will interest those concerned in such 

 matters, to learn what has come of an attempt on the part of 

 certain naturalists to establish an equilibrium in that way in New 

 Zealand. In that country, cultivators of the soil were not so badly 

 situated, on the whole, as regards insect -pests, only nature had 

 provided insects that did do some little damage to crops, and had 

 forgotten to supply the counterpoise in the shape of birds to prey 

 upon them. This little omission the Acclimatisation Society kindly 

 undertook to supply, and imported greenfinches, which have taken 

 kindly to the soil and multiplied prodigiously. It is not quite clear 

 what damage they have done to the particular scourges they were 

 expected to destroy ; but according to the New Zealand papers, the 

 Acclimatisation Society have lately been asked to supply poison to 

 destroy the finches ; and one poser addressed to the Society is a 

 request "to state what it proposes to do to remove these birds 

 from the country ! " In the meantime, the protection of the law, 

 which the finches have enjoyed hitherto, has been removed, and 

 a war of extermination against them is likely to commence. The 

 finches have increased so much these few years back in New Zealand, 

 that it is feared " they will soon eat the produce of every farmer in 

 the country." Where they abound, turnips can hardly be raised, 

 owing to their ravages, and wheat and oat fields are so stripped as 

 not to be worth cutting. In the attempts, to i^poison the birds by 

 means of poisoned seeds, many other valuable birds that it is desirable 

 to protect have been destroyed ; and altogether the balancing experi- 

 ment has produced such disastrous results that the Acclimatisation 

 Society, which no doubt acted on the advice of "scientific" naturalists, 

 has had to confess to having made some serious mistakes. 



