BLACKGAME 213 



game also were seriously affected. Their numbers during 

 the succeeding- years have certainly been reduced below 

 their previous high standard, but there seems now (1905) 

 every prospect of their regaining their former level. Long 

 may this desirable condition prevail, and may improved 

 breeds of mutton in the future be brought from the 

 Antipodes, or the Cape, or from British East Africa 

 (which latter colony I commend to the attention of 

 pastoral emigrants), and leave the blackcock in un- 

 molested enjoyment of those primeval moorlands — 

 swampy, rush-clad, and ill-drained — which are his 

 ancestral inheritance. 1 



The watershed of the Wansbeck is another stronghold 

 of blackgame in Northumberland. This, again, is a big 

 country- — a country of broad prairie-like pasturage and 

 infinite stretches of tawny grass. The following bags of 

 blackgame, made at Wellington, evidence the effects of 

 judicious and sportsmanlike shooting. In each case there 

 were three guns :■ — ■ 



September 2, 1902 — 35 Blackcocks, 3 Greyhens. 



12, 1903—32 „ 2 



9, 1904—30 „ 4 



14, 1905—45 „ 3 



Such figures need no comment of mine. For them 

 I am indebted to Sir Geo. O. Trevelyan, Bart., who 

 kindly adds:- — -"After fifty years, in wet seasons and 

 dry, I am strongly of opinion that blackgame should 



1 Lest this appear purely retrograde, it should be added that the 

 draining of moorland has, in places, been carried to excess. One result of 

 pipe-drainage on high-lying pasture (say 700 to 1000 feet) has been to 

 destroy the natural grasses and semi-aquatic plants that normally flourish 

 thereon. No other growth comes to replace these, and at such altitudes 

 tillage is not available. Here, the return on wasted capital has been 

 reduced produce and lowered rental : together with a sharp lesson to those 

 who thought their human shrewdness superior to Nature's matured plan. 



