22 



Bird Notes and News 



it must be because feathers are not going 



to be used, and consequently birds will 



not be killed to furnish them. If the 



trade were only going to France, obviously 



the French workers would have more, not 



less, work. 



* * * 



In point of fact, it would appear that 



the birds will be saved, and there will be 



very little dislocation of labour, because 



fancy-feather dressing is not a staple 



industry either in Paris or London. The 



thousands of British workpeople who were 



to be deprived of their livelihood, according 



to Mr. Downham, have been reduced by 



unimaginative statistics to six or seven 



hundred girls who occupy part of their 



time with fancy feather work, and are 



not paid remarkably well for doing it. 



So with regard to the workers in France, a 



well-known member of the Societe 



d'Acclimatation de France writes to the 



R.S.P.B. :— 



"The interests of workpeople — men, 

 women, and children — will not be affected 

 by the suppression of the plume trade. 

 They have many other openings for their 

 activity. It is only a very small batch 

 of speculators on the wholesale traffic 

 in feather goods that can have to suffer. 

 They are very rich." 



The feather-trade had another contention 

 which has been led out continually in com- 

 pany with British-trade. If the fancy 

 feathers went to France, the ostrich-feather 

 trade would inevitably go also. The presi- 

 dent of the " Fabricants de Plumes " puts 

 another complexion on this argument also. 

 England is not now going to lose her ostrich- 

 feather business ; on the contrary, it is 

 for this business that she is ruining the 

 fancy-feather trade : — 



" The public may think that the English 

 and the American are right to protect the 



birds. That is false. It is not a question 

 of humanity in the least, it is merely a 

 question of money . . . The Hobhouse 

 Bill is designed to protect the ostrich- 

 feather industry of the Cape. The associa- 

 tion of ostrich-farmers, numbering 1,700, 

 welcomes with both hands the proposed 

 law which will give the final blow to our 

 industry." 



* * * 



It is worth noting that Mr. T. M. Healy, 



who so bitterly attacked the Bill, and the 



Government for thinking about such a 



thing, nearly wrecked the Bird Protection 



Act of 1896. Ireland has to thank him 



that she alone of these islands is unable 



to protect her own birds throughout the 



year, to give Sunday protection, or to 



establish bird sanctuaries. 



* * * 



Allusion was made by Lord Newton at 

 the Society's Annual Meeting to the undesir- 

 able leniency of a public body in allowing 

 one of its servants to shoot wild birds on 

 a sewage farm, and thereby inviting the 

 destruction of rare and interesting species. 

 Another case has been reported to the 

 R.S.P.B., in which the keeper of a public 

 park was actually using, and apparently 

 accustomed to use, bird-traps for catching 

 the small birds of the park. The place, 

 writes a correspondent of the Society, is 

 admirably adapted to form a bird-sanctuary, 

 " but in two hours spent in the park we 

 saw only one bird ; many of its companions 

 have, no doubt, been caught, and are now 

 breaking their hearts in the filthy, crowded 

 bird-shops of the neighbouring big city." 

 Happily, this writer was prompt to act 

 by protesting to the authorities, and the 

 trap has, at any rate, disappeared. Some 

 further step seems necessary to bring back 

 and ensure the safety of the bird-life, 

 without which a park, however wooded and 

 flower-bedded, is only a mockery of nature. 



