70 



Bird Notes and News 



Hudson's pamphlet on " Lost British Birds," 

 published years ago by the Society. As 

 frontispiece stands the Passenger Pigeon, 

 existing in uncountable millions in the 

 States fifty years ago and now represented 

 by one individual in a zoological garden. 

 Dr. Hornaday devotes the second part of 



his book to the remedial measures necessary 

 to check the wanton waste of animal life. 

 Throughout he writes with the vigour of 

 conviction, and with the strenuous force of 

 a man still appalled by the facts with which 

 his investigations have brought him face to« 

 face. 



Notes. 



While the Royal Society for the Protection 



of Birds is seeking by a special effort to 



provide protection for migrating birds at 



lighthouses, Sir Herbert Maxwell is driven 



to condemn the ways of certain other 



naturalists who find in the birds' extremity 



science's opportunity. He writes {Pall Mall 



Gazette, February 6, 1913), that Mr. Eagle 



Clarke sets a good example in being content 



to register the arrivals of certain birds at 



the lights without finding it necessary to 



put them to death and produce their corpses 



as proof of his word. Professor Patten, 



on the other hand, treating of the migrations 



of the Robin in the January number of the 



Zoologist, appears to conclude that nobody 



will credit his abihty to recognise the species 



unless he " collects " it. 



" A robin came slowly up to the lantern 

 and as it fluttered I collected it. . . . I 

 observed a robin on the rock. It was tame, 

 rather fatigued, and easily collected, . . . 

 Two nights later I collected a robin, which 

 came in quietly and fluttered down the 

 lantern." 



And so on. This sort of thing. Sir Herbert 

 Maxwell truly says, is bringing discredit 

 upon science. " Heaven knows that our 

 birds have to encounter enough perils on 

 migration without the additional one of a 

 deliberate assassin lurking behind the glass 

 of the delusive lantern." 



"Nobody, one should think, can have 

 witnessed the dayhght migration of small 



birds across the ocean without some prompt- 

 ings of compassion. Their weary little wings 

 just serve to carry them clear of the waves ; 

 how touching it is when they take passage 

 on a passing ship ; instantly bury their 

 heads in their scapular feathers and going 

 fast asleep ! " 



A Somersetshire correspondent wTites : — 



" May I urge the case of the beautiful 

 little foreign finches and waxbills as claimants 

 on our humanity as well as British biids t 

 The common (though equally beautiful) 

 sorts are so cheap that their sufferings and 

 death by the thousand from disease, misery, 

 and cold, are of comparatively little conse- 

 quence to the dealers. The importation of 

 these wee creatures packed closely, almost 

 as sardines, entails so great an amount of 

 suffering that of those which survive the 

 voyage the greater number perish in a few 

 weeks as the result of the ordeal they have 

 gone through. I beheve the exportation 

 from Austraha is now prohibited. Would 

 that this were the case from other countries 

 or that a deterrent tax might be placed 

 upon them ! 



" I acknowledge, to my shame, that I 

 possess an aviary of these lovely and in- 

 teUigent little birds, but although with me 

 they live under the best conditions and 

 return %vith deUght to their aviary after 

 frequent outings, I should never have 

 started such a thing had I known as much 

 as I do now of the cruelty of the trade. 



" I have had birds sent me from a well- 

 known dealer in the north, packed in a small 

 box without food or water. They arrived 

 dead, of course, and on my indignant 

 remonstrance I was informed that the 

 money should be entered to my credit, as 

 if the trifling pecuniary loss and not the 



