vi PREFACE 



Between these two long parts there are five 

 shorter essays which I have retained with little 

 alteration, and these in one or two instances are 

 consequently out of date, especially in what was 

 said with bitterness in the essay on "Exotic Birds 

 for Britain" anent the feather-wearing fashion 

 and of the London trade in dead birds and the re- 

 fusal of women at that time to help us in trying 

 to save the beautiful wild bird life of this country 

 and of the world generally from extermination. 

 Happily, the last twenty years of the life and 

 work of the Royal Society for the Protection of 

 Birds have changed all that, and it would not 

 now be too much to say that all right-thinking per- 

 sons in this country, men and women, are anxious 

 to see the end of this iniquitous traffic. 



W. H. H. 



September, igig. 



