14 



Bird Notes and News 



They're wicked, mischievous birds." Then, 

 by way of exhibiting his own peculiar 

 ornithological knowledge, and of expressing 

 scorn of a clergyman who objected to the 

 trade : " How often is he up in the morning 

 early enough to hear the lark sing, I should 

 like to know " ! The birds, explained this 

 Avorthy, are tempted in hard weather by a 

 spread of food, and are caught in horsehair 

 snares, which remain set all day. There 

 they struggle piteously through the long 

 hours, starving in sight of the food round 

 about, until in the evening the snarer comes 

 round and wrings their necks. And then 

 smart society can have mauviettes on the 

 menu. At other times the birds are netted 

 or taken with decoys and lime, for the business 

 goes on briskly in Bedfordshire and Cam- 

 bridgeshire. As the Leeds Mercury observes : 



" The stomach triumphs over sentiment, 

 and the choir of birds, whose music is the best 

 and cheapest that the world has to offer, 

 is thinned with the recklessness that usually 

 obtains when there is £ s. d. as the reward." 



Whether they are British-born or merely 



immigrants, England, it must be admitted, 



is somewhat unpleasantly weighted with a 



ton and a half of Skylarks on her shoulders, 



when she expresses natural indignation at 



the export of her song-birds and at the 



terrific destruction of migrants in Italy. 



^ ^ ^ 



The appeal for " Homes for Birds " made 

 at the Society's Annual Meeting by Mr. 

 Collison, who has backed up his views in 

 so practical and generous a maimer, must 

 have reminded his hearers how very recent is 

 the growth of the popularity of the Nesting - 

 box in Britain. When the R.S.P.B. first 

 ventilated the idea it was generally regarded 

 as a fanciful absurdity, and the boxes were 

 often supposed to be for birds to roost and 

 shelter in through the winter. We are still 



indeed behind the Germans in such matters. 

 According to a leading German agricultural 

 paper, the Kaiser, who takes great interest 

 in Bird Protection, has ordered that the whole 

 eminence to the west of his Castle at Celle 

 is to be a bird-sanctuary ; bird-shelters have 

 been instituted in the gardens of military 

 barracks and hospitals, and an official 

 Rescript has been issued to Lords -Lieutenant 

 and Railway Boards bidding them especially 

 to protect the Swallow. In the Government's 

 forests of the Grand Duchy of Hesse, 9,300 

 Nesting-boxes have been put up, and an 

 order given that old trees are to be left stand- 

 ing. In Hungarian State Forests 14,000 

 Nesting-boxes are in use. 



Three books lately published tell of three 

 bird-lovers of curiously contrasting char- 

 acters and epochs. In her " Letters and 

 Recollections of Mazzini," Mrs. Hamilton 

 King reminds us of the Italian statesman's 

 love for animals. " The little birds that 

 flew about his room, nestled on his shoulder, 

 and fed from his hand, were one proof of 

 this." It was a characteristic he shared 

 with Garibaldi. " Two Years in a Forbidden 

 City," by Princess Der Ling, records that 

 the ex-Empress of China celebrates her 

 birthday each year by buying up vast 

 numbers of caged birds and liberating them. 

 (No doubt the bird-catchers provide well for 

 the occasion.) Finally, in Dr. Preserved 

 Smith's " Life of Luther," there is a charm- 

 ing letter written by the stern Reformer to a 

 student-servant who had turned bird-fowler. 

 He writes as the spokesman of the birds, 

 bringing their complaint to the master : — 



"We Thrushes, Blackbirds, Finches, 

 Linnets, Goldfinches, and all other pious, 

 honourable birds who migrate this autumn 

 over Wittenberg, give your kindness to know 

 that we are credibly informed that one 



