BIBD NOTES AND NEWS. 



76 



Stamford withdrew the measure on Ma}'' 15th, 

 after the second reading of Lord Jersey's 

 Bill. Its main provision, however, found no 

 place in the ultimate enactment ; and 

 although the valuable power to forfeit 

 apparatus was retained, half its value was 

 lost by the omission of the power to seize 

 and detain. Lord Stamford sought to 

 encourage the Society (in 1897) by assuring 

 them that there was no reason to doubt 

 that further legislation in this direction 

 would be welcomed as the years passed on. 

 But the bird-catcher, as a public nuisance, 

 has not yet been dealt with. 



With reference to Part VI. of " The Story 

 of Bird Protection," dealing Avith the Act of 

 1894, Mr. Harvie-Brown, F.R.S.E., writes :— 



" On the above excellent article upon the subject 

 which has so much of interest to bird-lovers and 

 true woll-wishers amongst naturalists, it seems not 

 inai)])i"o]iriate to \enture a few remarks. 



" We must, I think, all agree with Lord Balfour's 

 original remarks, but we are also free to advocate 

 the means employed on this side or on that. For 

 my own part, I believe in the advocacy of the 

 ' protection of certain species within specified 

 areas.' Without access to all that was said on 

 both sides, i.e. in favotir of local authorities' decision 

 versus ' jirotection of areas,' and the question of the 

 ability of the arguments on both sides, it is difficult 

 at this lapse of time to feel certain of the ground 

 covered. 



" With the Duke of Richmond and Gordoii we 

 cannot but agree,that there should not be too drastic 

 interference with the undeniable rights of jiroperty ; 

 and in this respect, tnd)/ one law for the rich and for 

 the poor. 



" With regard to a * natural piu-su it of bird-nesting' 

 common to all boys, that is already becoming 

 modified in its effects ; and boys are being taught 

 that bird-nesting may be continued without the 

 senseless destruction or pilfering of the contents of 

 the nests. It is curious that in some districts, in 

 order to assist our police in carrying out the law, 

 the collecting of the eggs of various species in such 

 districts has not only been advocated, but e\en 

 carried out ; and avowedly for this piu'pose, j)olice- 

 men have been so encoLU'aged themselves to form 

 collections of birds-eggs. I can vouch for this in 

 at least one district in the south-east of Scotland. 

 Similarly, if knowledge and the training of futirre 

 ornithologists and oologists is not entirely to be 

 given up, it is equally desirable that a certain pro- 

 portion of birds-eggs be collected — as the phrase 

 runs — ' for scientific purposes.' The difficulty is to 

 define the line at which such collecting should stop. 



But this af)pears plain enough — local atdlioriiiea 

 in such affairs can scarcely be expected to be fair 

 judges ! If tho British Museum be allowed to go 

 against the general law, why not the schoolboy 

 and the poUceman who collect for scientific or 

 legal (?) purposes — or rather, as said, who shall be 

 judge between them ? 



" The simj)lest method aj)pear8 to be : The pro- 

 tection of certain areas which are known to contain 

 tho nesting haunts of rare species. In this I have 

 always agreed with Professor A. Newton, though 

 I would reserve to the owners of land the right to 

 keep down to reasonable limits — according to their 

 own judgment — Jackdaws and Crows and ' vormin ' 

 within such defined areas, thus probably best pro- 

 tecting the said rarer species it is designed by law 

 to protect therein ; and to grant to such jilaces 

 whore the eggs of w ild-birds ' form a harvest to the 

 poor islanders ' — freedom, excopt in the case of rarer 

 s])ocios. Nobody could be trusted to do this better 

 — by law — than the servants on such estates ; and 

 thus recognize that birds' eggs are the property of the 

 man on whose land they are laid. 



"Sir Herbert Maxwell's compromise certainly 

 appears to be the only sensible way out of the diffi- 

 culty But though adopted in some admirable 

 instances where nothing else coidd ha\e worked 

 better, some of these same areas ha\ o -ince been 

 swallowed u]) by some general ado]4ion of whole- 

 county areas, as in the case of Tontsniuir, Fife ; and 

 oven extended — with a charu/e of (Jovernment — to 

 much larger and loss well-defined areas, comphcating 

 tho work of County Councils and local authorities, 

 instead of simplifjang it. To ma'<e one schedide 

 suitable for ' all counties north of the Forth and 

 Clyde,' for instance, as against ' all the counties 

 south of the same,' does not simplify the hsts of 

 species to be preserved, but entails a much wider 

 special knowledge upon County Councils, local 

 authorities and magistrates, and others whose 

 business it is to see the laws carried out." 



With reference to the Green Plover, ]\Ir. 

 Har\ae-Bro\Mi adds : — 



" Those who appreciate the far-sightedness of 

 our more virile Republican cousins with regard 

 to ' taking over large supplies of our Lapwing's 

 eggs,' ought to realize the importance of the proposal 

 to render the sale of Plovers' eggs in this country- 

 absohitehj illegal. In, I think, the time of James II., 

 there was an old Act of Scotland, which entailed 

 upon all loyal subjects to ' destroy all Peesweeps' 

 eggs lest we should provide food for our ' — ahem ! — 

 ' southern neighbours.' 



" The Act was never — in words — repealed, I fancy, 

 though in practice it may be discontinued and pro- 

 vided against by our ' Preservation Acts ' {supra). 

 If the sale of ' Peesweeps' ' eggs were stopped, our 

 southern neighbours and ourselves would be pro- 

 vided with a much larger — bulkier — supply of food, 

 because a grown-up Lapwing has more flesh upon 

 it than when in ovuin or in embryo ! At least 

 let us try it, say, the length of time between the 

 renewals of the County Council Lists and Schedules 

 in Scottish areas, beginning, say, in 1912." 



