32 LOST AND VANISHING BIRDS 



the Spoonbill, the Crane, and other vanished 

 species would be dwellers in our land to-day ; for 

 there are plenty of these birds across the Channel, 

 almost within view of the white cliffs of England. 

 But individual birds are closely confined to certain 

 areas, and to these they keep with fatal pertinacity, 

 so that, if we destroy all the individuals in one 

 area, the chances are that that area will remain 

 depopulated for ever. The record of extermination 

 in the British Islands abundantly proves the 

 truth of this assertion ; for in every case where 

 the native stock has been exhausted, the species 

 has dropped out of our fauna completely, unless 

 introduced by man, as the sedentary Capercaillie 

 was. No bird of strictly migratory habits that 

 has been exterminated in the British Islands will 

 ever return to them again, notwithstanding any 

 and every effort that man may make to reinstate 

 the species. The sedentary Bustard might be 

 induced to take up its quarters with us again, 

 but the migratory Crane under no circumstances 

 whatever will ever return as our summer guest. 

 Bearing these facts in mind, it behoves us to guard 

 jealously what few large birds remain to us, and 

 in the case of vanishing species to see that they 

 are carefully preserved, especially during the 



