Introductory. 19 



At the close of many an enjoyable walk 

 after snipe I have been thankful that these 

 overcrowded islands still contain a few square 

 miles of sodden useless land — useless, that 

 is, to anything or any one but the jolly 

 little bird and the mortal to whom it affords 

 his favourite sport. Alas ! the unreclaimed 

 tracts are getting fewer and fewer every 

 year. Ominous wooden pegs, the outposts 

 of railways to follow, are being driven in 

 where once lay four mottled eggs, the pride 

 of their long-billed mother, who has flown 

 for ever to seek quiet nurseries elsewhere, 

 far from the hideous proximity of engineer- 

 ing mankind. Cultivation, the birth of pros- 

 perity but the death of wild sport, is en- 

 croaching yard by yard on the moorlands 

 which our fathers probably thought eternal. 

 It would be useless and wrong to complain. 

 There are more important claims than snipe- 

 shooting on the empty acres. But it is impos- 

 sible not to mourn the gradual disappearance 

 of our beloved solitudes before the irresistible 

 advance of science and agriculture. 



