BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



29 



of specific cases of importation to this country, 

 and also of specific cases of requests for a supply of 

 birds from a portion of his territory. In order 

 to try and stop the export a special reward was 

 offered by a public notice of May 11th, 1907. If 

 we had here a law preventing the import, I take it 

 that we should strengthen his hands very con- 

 siderably. 



Mi:. Fountain: So far as the figures of the im- 

 ports of ornamental feathers arc shown, they amount 

 to somewhere about £2.000,000 worth, of which 

 the bulk are from the Cape of Good Hope, and 

 mainly ostrich feathers ; but there remain about 

 £700,000 to £800,000 worth of other feathers, 

 and it seems to us that that is rather a large trade 

 to prohibit. A very large proportion of the trade 

 comes from France, and we are naturally not 

 particularly anxious to interfere with our com- 

 mercial relations with France. ... It seems to 

 us that to prohibit the importation into one par- 

 ticular country would be but a very small step 

 towards the preservation of whole species of birds. 



Marquess of Bristol : There are a number of 

 countries — India and some of the Colonies — which 

 have rules against the export of these birds ; is 

 there any way in which you could render assistance 

 to these countries in making effective their pro- 

 hibition against export ? — I doubt if we could do 

 very much, as the bulk of the feathers, other than 

 ostrich feathers from the Cape, come to us through 

 France, and to some extent through Germany, and 

 we should have no means of knowing what the 

 country of origin of the birds was. 



Would it be possible to obtain that information 

 through the Board of Trade, so as to assist those 

 countries ? — I do not see how that would be 

 possible. 



Chairman : If feathers come from Calcutta or 

 from Bombay, the export of which was prohibited 

 by the Indian Act, would it not be tolerably clear that 

 they had been introduced in violation of the Act, 

 and could not the Board of Trade do something ? 

 — I do not think so ; because out of the total im- 

 portation of ornamental feathers of all kinds, only 

 £1000 come direct from India. 



SMUGGLING FROM INDIA. 



Sir Nathaniel Highmore : The exportation 

 from India is done in rather an artful way. and 

 fictitious names are used, or fictitious add' 

 sometimes, and the skins of birds are exported in 

 cases described as containing cowhair or horsehair. 

 We have had three or four communications from 

 the Indian Customs of cases having been exported, 

 and they have sent a cable over to us to ask if we 



could examine the cases when they came here. 

 The first of those that we had this year was on 

 March 5th, relating to six cases of cowhair coming 

 by a particular shi|>. We found thai under a layer 

 of horsehair there were 820 lbs. of birdskins 

 — paroquets, and the number of skins was G400. 

 We placed these birdskins under detention, 

 because under the Customs law, where the i 

 of the ship makes a report, he is bound to state the 

 true facts in connection with it; and if he states 

 that tin' contents of a case are not what they turn 

 out to be, the goods are liable to be taken to tin' 

 King's warehouse, and the report can only be 

 amended by consent of the Commissioners of 

 Customs. After the explanation had been given, 

 we allowed the report to be amended, because we 

 had no substantial power to do otherwise. 



If this Bill had been in operation then, you would 

 have been able to act ? — Yes, to detain them 

 entirely. . . . This particular importation led to 

 further inquiries witli regard to several other im- 

 portations, that had come in. We then discovered t hat 

 between December 20th, 1907, and February loth, 

 1908, there had been five other importations, in two 

 instances of four cases and in the other tliree of 

 five cases, of dead birdskins, and they were all 

 declared as either cowhair or horsehair. We had 

 also two telegrams in March of this year relating 

 to osprey feathers that were sent by parcel post. 

 The Postmaster-General in one case sent them back 

 to the Indian Post Office from which they were 

 sent, and in another case the feathers are at the 

 King's warehouse at the present time, awaiting 

 instructions as to their disposal. There was another 

 ease which the Post Office had, I think, last Nov- 

 ember, in which a parcel was described as some form 

 of dress material, and that parcel was found to 

 contain feathers, and was also sent back. 



Marquess of Bristol : In matters of this sort, where 

 you know imports have been made into this country 

 of things which are supposed not to be exported, 

 you can take action without instructions ? — We 

 could, if this Bill passes. . . . Even when the ex- 

 planation was obtained from India, we had no power 

 under the British Customs Law to do otherwise 

 than give them up. We had no power to destroy 

 them ; we had no real power to detain them merely 

 because there had been a technical breach of the 

 Customs Law. ... If the master of the ship had 

 known they were birdskins and had reported 

 them as such here, we could have done nothing. 



Marquess of Bristol : The country from which they 

 were imported could have prosecuted ? — Not with- 

 out the goods being sent back to them. In one 

 case, where the goods were sent back by the Post 



