Bird Notes and News 



59 



Notes. 



" A Practical Handbook of British Birds," 

 edited by Mr. H. F. Witherby, M.B.E., 

 M.B.O.U., aud now being issued serially in 

 18 parts by Messrs. Witherby & Co., is, as 

 might be expected, ornithology fully up to date, 

 with trinomials, difEerentiation of species and 

 allied or sub-species, and minute details of 

 ])lumage, measurements, size, and structure, 

 and of eggs and young. Obviously, it appeals 

 mainly to those to whom a bird in the hand is 

 worth many in the bush, but the brief " field 

 characters " (mostly by the editor) are admir- 

 able as far as they go. The occasional plates, 

 coloured and black-and-white, are by Mr. 

 Gron\-old, and there are also diagrams in the 

 text. 



^ ^ ^ 



The Bombay Humanitarian League have 

 now an official organ. The Indian Humanitarian, 

 published in English and in Gujarati, and 

 directed against cruelties in the slaughter- 

 liouse, in vivisection, in reUgious ceremonies, 

 and in fashions of dress. The first number 

 contains a portrait of Mr. Labhshanker 

 Laxmidas, one of the pioneers of the movement 

 in India and an untiring worker for birds and 

 l>easts. For some years Mr. Laxmidas has 

 been an honorary secretary in India for the 

 R.S.P.B., and he visited England for the 

 special purpose of studying its methods of 

 humanitarian work. 



During the past year, reports the National 

 Association of Audubon Societies, bird-plumage 

 to the value of $150,000 has been seized by 

 Customs Officials of New York City, including 

 150 plumes of the Goura or Crowned Pigeon. 

 An attempt made to smuggle the skins of Gulls 

 from Maine into Canada, for millinery, has. 

 it is believed, been fru.strated by the Canadian 

 authorities. 



* :;: * 



Colonel H. A. R. May makes an adiniiablc 

 suggestion on the subject of War Memorials 

 which every member of the Societv would be 

 glad, and might help, to see adopted in villa gr 

 churchyards and (>lsewhere. Struck, as manv 

 persons have been, by the useless and often 

 unattractive form of Wai' Memorials for which 

 large sums of money are laiscd, he proposes 



that in the case of such monuments to British 

 chivalry and courage, it might be possible 

 to erect something that would, if tended 

 and cared for, be a benefit to birds as well as 

 an artistic memorial to the fallen— in the form 

 of a bird-fountain or bird-house, ornamental 

 and useful, and with due provision of cenotaph 

 or column for inscribed names. 



With reference to the feeding of birds in 

 winter, which is so necessary and pleasurable 

 a duty in hard weather, Major-General 

 Carnegy writes : — 



" The coconut for Tits is usually hung the open 

 end uppermost, in the position of acup. Consequently, 

 when rain falls it is filled with water. The proper 

 plan is to saw ofJ both ends of the nut very close 

 to the top and bottom, and hang it up in a horizontal 

 position, like a slung barrel. The birds can then get 

 at the kernel from either end, and no water will lodge 

 iu the shell." 



This is. of course, the position shown in the 

 Societv "s leaflet " Remember the Birds." 



It is early days to talk of nesting boxes, but 

 more than one instance is recorded by corres- 

 pondents of double nests, built in and on these, 

 last season. One correspondent tells of a 

 Great Tit family inside a box, with a blackbird'.s 

 nest on the top ; also of a Blue Tit established 

 within another box, aud a Robin setting up 

 house without. A second writer writes of 

 a Blue Tit rearing a family inside a box, while 

 a Blackbird built on the lid. In the latter 

 case the box was hung low on the wall of the 

 house. 



A corrcsjKindent in East Sussex, a naturalist 

 of long experience, writes to chronicle the 

 ])resence of a AVhite's Thrush, seen on his own 

 land : "I had so good a view that there was 

 no mistake about the species, as so often 

 hap])ens when only a momentary glance 

 is obtained." This species was first recorded 

 for England at Christchurch. Hampshire, 

 where oue was shot by Lord Malniesbury in 

 1828, and was named in honour of Gilbert 

 White. It is con.siderably larger than the 

 Throstle, being 12 in. in length, and the boldly 

 mottled plumage also distinguishes it. 



