Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, ^c. 373 



loftier sisters have been haunted thus, yet oology, that modest 

 offshoot of embryology, might have hoped to escape. On her 

 behalf I must crave permission to enter a protest against the 

 treatment to which she has been exposed. I could say much 

 on the injudicious and reckless course of many of her sincere 

 friends, whose free handling of many a waning species contrasts 

 painfully with their tender manipulation of the eggs " in situ " 

 (in their cabinet), whose bribes imperil the continuance in our 

 island of the royal Eagle, and corrupt the morals of the once- 

 faithful guardians of the Scottish forests. It is indeed painful 

 to see the generous efforts of princely proprietors to preserve the 

 last relics of a royal race thus baffled. One almost shudders 

 at the ruthlessness with which a scientific friend can relate 

 the feat of his having " harried " two Golden Eagle nests on the 

 same day. While I fully admit the interest and value of an 

 indigenous collection, and believe that the value of oology, as 

 a branch of ornithic embryology, in determining the divisions of 

 genera and the affinities of species, is scarcely yet sufficiently 

 acknowledged by naturalists, I must denounce as not only use- 

 less, but mischievous, the inordinate craving after a long series 

 of British-taken specimens of our rarer birds. We all deprecate 

 the achievements of the gunner who stalks behind a hedge after 

 every rare bird in his neighbourhood, and then chronicles his 

 exploits in the pages of the ' Zoologist.^ Is the indefatigable 

 " British-egg " collector a less mischievous depredator ? 



I can only hope that Mr. Fenwick, who has cast his protecting 

 arms round the grilse, will, when he has secured to our fish- 

 spawn the rest he promises on its own river-bed, devote his 

 kindly sympathies to the homes of our native birds. I can fully 

 comprehend, for I participate myself in the enthusiasm of the 

 friend who exclaimed, on being asked his opinion of a somewhat 

 variable egg, " I do not profess to understand an Eaglets or 

 an Osprey's egg unless I see a drawerful ;" but can we not, 

 when the identity of the species is indisputable, content oui*- 

 selves with supplying our series from regions where there are 

 enough and to spare ? 



Enough as to the indiscreet zeal of the true naturalist. There 

 is another and larger class, the mere collectors, who gather eggs 



