84 Notes and Notices. [^^^ 



Emu 

 Oct. 



have either been forgotten or grown famous sought out its 

 treasures in bird-life. Gould, Swainson, and Lewin, Masters, 

 Ramsay, Bennett, and other less known names — what sugges- 

 tions they offer as the " bird " possibilities of a strip of coast 

 whose flora is unique, whose bird-life has features, consequently, 

 of its own. These facts alone should be an inspiration for a 

 great gathering of present-day bird-lovers. In addition to the 

 usual formal business, including the consideration of a " Check- 

 List " of Australian birds, some most interesting papers will be 

 read at the meetings, and Mr. Robert Hall, F.L.S., C.M.Z.S., 

 hopes to deliver a highly popular lecture on his trip through 

 Japan, Manchuria, and Siberia (regions possessing much interest 

 at the present juncture). A " camp-out " should prove one of 

 the most enjoyable features of the gathering. 



A National Park. — Scarcely any other civilized country 

 under the face of the sun has done less in the way of preserving 

 its original fauna and flora than Australia. We are really behind 

 the English-speaking and even the Japanese race. New South 

 Wales and New Zealand are the only honourable exceptions 

 amongst our group. In the former a tolerable area of suitable 

 land has been vested in trustees ; in New Zealand several islands 

 around the coast are so strictly protected that no one without a 

 special " permit " may even land. Professor Baldwin Spencer 

 and several others have continued an agitation which was com- 

 menced some years ago by the Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria, 

 to have Wilson's Promontory — an area of land virtually of no 

 use for anything else — proclaimed a permanent National Park, 

 where the few species that remain of what in a few years will 

 be obsolete (though really typical) may have room to exist for a 

 few years longer. Had our politicians the real interests of the 

 country at heart they would act as statesmen in America have 

 done — have areas permanently reserved for bird and animal 

 protection — not make a pretence of doing anything, as in the case 

 of the Victorian " National Park " at Wilson's Promontory, or 

 some others that could be named. One of the most suitable areas 

 in Victoria was " proclaimed " in the same way as Wilson's Prom- 

 ontory has been up to the present. Result — an invasion of 

 lo-acre men, who cut down, burned, destroyed all shelter for 

 our fauna and avifauna — went even beyond legitimate rights 

 to do so. A further result — they cannot even make a living 

 from their " blocks," hence want to pass on. Now the same 

 nonsensical process is wanted to be applied to Wilson's Promon- 

 tory. Why not take a lesson from the Yellowstone reserve in 

 America, or even from those nearer home, the two National 

 Parks in New South Wales? In both the latter cases fertile 

 country has been conceded. In Victoria the "selecting demon" 

 has his eye on every inch of land — worthless or not — which may 

 be burned and " cleared." 



