Bird Notes and News 



exempting plumage forming part of the 

 wearing apparel of persons entering the 

 kingdom has been omitted ; it was 

 pointed out that this would allow of 

 plumage being brought in from other 

 countries in contravention of the inten- 

 tion of the Act, and in a manner pre- 

 judicial to British retail traders. 



The second reading of the Bill was 

 taken on March 9th, at the close of 

 one of the most momentous of the 

 Home Rule debates ; and it is evidence 

 of the interest taken in the question, 

 that so large a number of Members 

 remained for another four hours to 

 debate on the Plumage Bill. Effort was, 

 however, made on the part of the oppo- 

 nents to postpone the question still 

 further. In the first place, Mr. Handel 

 Booth asked the Government to adjourn 

 the House instead of taking the second 

 reading, and when this was refused, Sir 

 Edwin Cornwall formally moved the 

 adjournment, objecting that it had only 

 been known since Thursday that the 

 discussion would be taken on that day 

 (Monday). Mr. Hobhouse said that if 

 the Bill were allowed a second reading 

 he would undertake to hear every 

 possible objection, and there would be 

 ample opportunity for discussion in 

 Committee. It was not a controversial 

 or a party measure. 



The motion for adjournment was 

 rejected by 337 votes to 49. 



THE PLUMAGE TRADE. 



Mr. Hobhouse, in moving the second 

 reading of the Bill, said it was designed 

 to protect birds whose plumage was coveted 

 on account of its beauty, and whose num- 

 bers were in danger of being reduced to 

 the vanishing point. It was also designed 

 to protect them from cruel and unnecessary 

 and wanton slaughter. The number of 

 birds killed in this trade was really almost 



incredible. Five or six sales were con- 

 ducted in the City of London in the course 

 of the year, and the plumages exhibited 

 in the warehouses in Cutler Street. An 

 article in the "Fortnightly Review," 

 which he had himself checked for the 

 purposes of accuracy, set out comprehen- 

 sively some of the large number of birds 

 so killed and exposed for sale. In Decem- 

 ber, 1912, there was put up for auction 

 the plumage of 75,000 Herons. In June, 

 1913, the plumage of 77,000 Herons, 

 22,000 Ciowned Pigeons, 25,000 Humming 

 Birds, 162,000 Smyrnian Kingfishers, and 

 so on, and the list could be almost 

 indefinitely prolonged. This showed that 

 the contention of the trade that the 

 destruction was not widespread was an 

 idle contention, and had no relation to the 

 facts of the case. 



Many of these birds were among the most 

 beautiful objects in nature, and if once a 

 species was destroyed, no force known to 

 man could replace it. 



PREVIOUS BILLS. 



It could hardly be said that the Bill had 

 been sprung on the House. It was almost 

 indentical with that of Lord Avebury's of 

 1908, introduced into the House of 

 Commons by Lord Hugh Cecil and Mr. 

 Ramsay Macdonald. In 1910, 1911, and 

 1912, Mr. Alden proposed similar legisla- 

 tion ; in the early part of last year Mr. 

 Page Croft introduced a Bill into the House. 

 There was, therefore, neither novelty nor 

 party bias about the proposals ; they were 

 inspired by love of nature and by the 

 promptings of humanity. In 1908 a Select 

 Committee of the House of Lords held a 

 most searching inquiry into the trade and 

 the methods by which it was conducted, and 

 the facts elicited undoubtedly startled many 



