Bird Notes and News 



35 



Hudson was planning an enlarged edition 

 of " Lost British Birds," but his hand 

 was held by an exasperated despair when 

 he looked out upon the unchecked course 

 of the bird-collector and of his brother- 

 claimant to " scientific " notoriety, the 

 rapacious oologist. 



With the feathered woman and the 

 collector was bracketed another topic 

 which aroused Mr. Hudson's anger to the 

 full ; the doings of the unspeakable bird- 

 catcher and of his ally and employer the 

 bird-eager. In " Birds in a Village " the 

 happy days described with such dehcate 

 charm become clouded when he is intro- 

 duced to the methods of the catcher at 

 Cookham Dene ; and on his initiation 

 began an attempt to secure protection 

 for all birds in Maidenhead Thicket which 

 went on for years, only to end (tem- 

 porarily at least) in failure because of the 

 refusal of an otherwise friendly sportsman 

 to have the guns of his keepers controlled. 

 In the same volume the fanciful chapter 

 " The Eagle and the Canary " and a part 

 of the final " Appendix " sought to reach 

 the bird-lover who makes prisoners of 

 his pets. The leaflet " Bird Catching " 

 (1894) contains a demand for further 

 legislation to save depleted species. The 

 Act of 1896 enabled County Councils to 

 do something in this matter ; and the 

 Goldfinch, taken as a case in point, has 

 now (1922) been protected in aU but 

 three of the administrative county areas 

 of England, and has, as Mr. Hudson 

 predicted, quickly recovered its numbers 

 in spite of the cry that high farming had 

 caused its disappearance. 



No plea more touching, more eloquent, 

 could be put forward on behalf of the less 

 fortunate cousin of the Goldfinch than 

 the story of "A Linnet for Sixpence," 

 written by Mr. Hudson for the Society in 

 1904. This was succeeded in 1911 by 

 a leaflet for children, " A Thrush that 

 never Lived," which forms a characteristic 

 contrast to the crude little tracts on 

 kindness generally put into children's 

 hands ; and a third pamphlet, in 1914, 

 threw a much-needed light " On Liberat- 

 ing Caged Birds." 



Mr. Hudson's latest gift to the Society, 

 " The Tired Traveller " (reprinted from 

 " Birds and Man "), appeared last year. 

 He also wrote an introduction to 

 Waterton's plea for "The Barn Owl," 

 issued in 1895, and one of the Educational 

 Series of leaflets, that on the Pipits. 

 Over and beyond all this have been 

 letters to the papers on various Bird 

 Protection subjects, notably a strong 

 protest in the Times in 1900 against 

 the proposed erection of a Physical 

 Laboratory in the Old Deer Park, which 

 would have ruined and destroyed the 

 adjoining Cottage Gardens at Kew as 

 a bird sanctuary. His advice was also 

 constantly sought in the making of 

 Bird Protection Orders under the Acts 

 of 1894 and 1896, since no one knew 

 as he did the birds and the characteristics 

 of the counties. 



It will thus be seen that throughout 

 the arduous years of a struggUng Hterary 

 hfe, the great naturahst whom every 

 Nature-lover mourns, gave of himself 

 and his work without stint to a cause 

 neither rich nor popular, intent only 

 on saving the creatures he loved. His 

 writings laid the foundation of the 

 belated Plumage Act ; they brought 

 about the Act prohibiting the taking 

 of birds by hooks, and, to a great extent, 

 the Pole Trap Act. Beyond results 

 that can be seen, his influence has 

 effected more than can ever be estimated, 

 and none can doubt that his voice will 

 continue to speak down the ages. 

 Litterateurs at last agreed to give him, 

 almost too late for him to heed or care, 

 that place in Enghsh hterature which 

 he won long ago ; but what have the 

 naturaUsts as a body, and the section 

 of the world which stretches out avid 

 hands for his first editions, done for 

 the cause which was nearest to his heart ? 

 It is a good many years since, having 

 spoken his strongest against the feather- 

 wearing fashion, he vowed that he would 

 speak no more on the detested thing, 

 and he kept the vow even through the 



