62 



Bird Notes and News 



1899 and 1900, Mr. Sliarpe'.s Bill for protecting 

 all birds with exempted County '" black lists." 

 Mr. Frederick Webb Headley, M.A., whose 

 works on The Structure (Did Life of Birds and 

 on Flight have taken their ])laee among standard 

 works on ornithology, and who was a friend of 

 long standing of the R.S.P.B., died at Epsom, 

 on November 25th, at the age of 63. Mr. 

 Headley was for 40 years assistant Master at 

 Haileybury College, and to him the College 

 very largely owes its pre-eminence in natural 

 history. He had retired before the war, but 

 rejoined the staff to free a younger man. 



One of the most devoted and zealous of the 

 Society's workers, Mr. John Carey, passed 

 away on November 17th. Gentle and un- 

 assuming in disposition, Mr. Carey was a 

 passionate lover of nature and a devoted friend 

 of birds and animals ; and as Hon. Secretary, 

 first for Stirling and subsequently for Perth, 

 he had for over 15 years been very successful, 

 by the force of his own deep feeling, in gaining 

 sympathy and support for the Society. He was 

 the author of one of its pamphlets, Birdcatchimj 

 and Bird-Caging, and never missed an oppor- 

 tunity to forward the cause. 



Bird and Tree Challenge Shield Competition. 



There are signs of after-war revival in the 

 Comjjetition this year, although in some 

 counties entries were still lamentably small : 

 teachers who had been absent on Service having 

 hardly settled down to their old work, and, 

 as more than one of them writes, children 

 showing a noticeable slackness since the 

 Armistice — thinking, like many of their elders, 

 that peace should mean play. The general 

 iinrest has its effect even in village schools, 

 making confinement and desk-work tiresome ; 

 but nothing should hel]) to overcome this 

 better than the active and engrossing outdoor 

 work of Bird and Tree watching. The recom- 

 mendation of the Departmental Committee 

 that a Bird-day should be appointed for all 

 schools should also have a stimulating effect. 

 Such a general celebration, say, on St. Valen- 

 tine's Day, might well be a culminating point 

 for the Bird and Tree studies of the year. 



The case for the Bird and Tree scheme can 

 hardly be put better than is done in a circular 

 letter sent to Norfolk Schools this autunm by 

 the Secretary of the Norfolk Education Com- 

 mittee (Mr. T. A. Cox). He writes :— 



" The Education Act, 1918, desires tliat a new spirit 

 should animate the teaching — a spirit of inquiry 

 leading to self effort on the part of each and evcrj' 

 child. What a child finds out for himself that he 

 knows and is interested in 



" The test of the success of the work of the school 

 is not so much what the child has learnt when it leaves 

 as whether what he has learnt has created a thirst for 

 knowledge and desire to continue to acquire it. 



" I know no subject of study connected witJi ele- 

 mentary school work which, taken up in the right 

 spirit, is so capable of creating interest, stimulating 

 curiosity, quickening the perception, and storing the 

 mind with first-hand ki;owledge of the living things 

 around them, thereby teaching how knowledge should 



be acquired, facts learnt and records arranged and 

 classified, as tlie study of Birds and Trees required by 

 the Bird and Tree Scheme. 



" It has the additional advantages of being pur- 

 sued in the open air under the healthiest conditions ; 

 of being associated with school forms of expression — 

 dra^^■ing, painting, composition, etc. ; and of stimulat- 

 ing and quickening the general interest of the child 

 resulting in increased keenness and intelligence in the 

 acquisition of other subjects of school study. Under 

 this Scheme the teacher assumes his true function of 

 director, stimulator and referee in cases of doubt and 

 difficulty. 



" Teachers are too a])t to look upon the Bird and 

 Tree Scheme as a ' Competition ' in which owing to 

 their .special school difficulties they feel they would be 

 handicapped compared with other schools. May I 

 ask you to brush this ' Competition ' idea aside, and 

 to I'cgard the Bird and Tree Scheme as an educational 

 factor of the greatest value, capable of giving enjoy- 

 ment to the children in its pursuit, and possible of 

 development in the future to an extent we may not 

 at the moment realise." 



INTER-COUNTY SHIELD. 



The final contest for the highest award 

 of the year, the Inter-County Shield, lay 

 between Newburgh (Lancashire) and Necton 

 (Norfolk), and it goes to Newburgh, which 

 has on two previous occasions won its County 

 Shield, and now sends papers of genuine ex- 

 cellence, showing capital observation and real 

 piactical knowledge, written moreover without 

 notes and in a good clear style. The Necton 

 essays are also from memory, long, enthusiastic, 

 and intelligent, and well deserve the second 

 ])lace. The third place is taken by the Holme 

 School, Headley (Hants). 



'TAILBY'" OWL PRIZES. 



The essays on owls sent in among the Bird 

 and Tree papers and eligible for special prizes, 



