I 76 Frotn Magazines, &c. [isf "jan 



tion of particular facts, only presented to the reader what was 

 necessary to the matter in hand and publications of enduring- 

 value. Certainly, it was easier for them to do great things than 

 it is for our generation. They could still draw from a full well; 

 in their times it was in many respects easier than it is now to 

 gain for oneself a rich ornithological experience, a comprehen- 

 sive knowledge founded on original observation, to be passed 

 on to others through the medium of publication. At that time 

 the prevailing conditions were very different, and incomparably 

 more favourable to ornithological studies than those existing to- 

 day. Civilization has advanced at the expense of wild life, and 

 in the first degree of that bird-life which was formerly so rich. 

 The last few decades have brought about a rapid decrease in 

 the numbers of species and individuals of the bird-world in 

 many parts of Central Europe. The dense quick-set hedges on 

 the borders of fields and hills have been uprooted, and replaced 

 in gardens by lattice-work or wire fences. Bush and thick 

 underwood has been cut down, hollow trees in woods are 

 tolerated no longer by modern forestry, every strip of arable 

 land that could be cultivated has been put under the plough. 

 In this way many small birds, hollow-breeders, and desert-loving 

 species lose protection and the chance to nest, become rarer, and 

 finally disappear altogether from the neighbourhoods where 

 such alterations as indicated prejudice their remaining. 

 Artificial nest-boxes offer, it is true, some compensation, but in 

 the first place they are not nearly widely enough used, and in 

 the second they cannot be a real and complete substitute for 

 every kind of oppressed hole-breeding bird for the natural 

 breeding places that have been taken from them. But the birds 

 of the swamp, with all their interest for the observer, are in the 

 worst case of all. That great predatory animal, Homo sapiens 

 by name, robs them of one territory after another, with dire 

 consequences. Swamps and morasses are drained, or, as lately 

 in Mecklenburg, are turned into huge fish-hatcheries. In 

 Germany there are now only a few places — as Schlesien, 

 Brandenburg, East and West Prussia, Mecklenburg, Schleswig- 

 Holstein, and North Hanover- — where rich and little-disturbed 

 swamp-bird life may be observed in its natural state, apart from 

 the shore and banks of the sea lakes and rivers, where at the 

 seasons of migration water-birds show up more or less regularly 

 on their passage through. We read with sorrowful envy to-day 

 the old descriptions of golden conditions which then so many 

 parts of Germany, long since put under cultivation, could show 

 in this respect. We are filled with deep regret on the one side 

 by the brutal system of plunder which is put into operation 

 against water-birds (especially the persecution of Herons), and 

 on the other by the swift-advancing reclamation of swamp lands 

 even in countries such as Hungary, which right up to the most 



