PREFACE TO FORMER ISSUE. ix. 
decrease of this and other birds, 
says .— 
“Well I remember, in my boyish hours, 
Gazing with rapture on the fan-tail’d Kite, 
As, hovering full o’er Brecknock’s ivied towers, 
Slowly he wheeled his solitary flight. 
* * * * * * 
Now ’mid the landscape he is seen no more, 
Fanning his broad wings in the noontide sun, 
Scared from his circuit on that ’customed shore, 
By prowling keeper arm’d with trap and gun. 
* * * * * * 
Hence with each year more dull our woods become, 
The tapping Woodpecker, the chattering Pie, 
Now rarely heard: the whooping Owl is dumb, 
The Raven calls not to his mate on high.” 
The above verses were written 
more than thirty-five years ago, and 
assuredly our birds, with some few 
exceptions, have not increased since 
then. The Crane (Gvus cinerea), 
Bustard (Otis tarda), and Peregrine 
(Falco peregrinus) are extinct, and 
but for the care of a few land- 
owners, the Black Grouse (Zetrao 
tetvix) would long ere this have 
followed their example. I therefore 
hope, before our list gets smaller, 
that this little work may be of 
