Birds as Crop Protectors 
of wild birds are beneficial to man, that the 
insect-eating and vermin-eating species in 
particular are invaluable to him in field and 
garden, and that the destruction of birds and 
eggs, even of those species deemed to be in- 
jurious, should not be permitted, since useful 
ones inevitably suffered also( Times, 24.1v.18). 
In April 1918 came the startling news that 
large numbers of MAGpPIEs, believed to have 
been driven across the Channel by the 
fighting in France, had invaded Romney 
Marsh in Kent and were attacking and killing 
breeding ewes (Globe, 10.iv.18)—a statement, 
I venture to think, which must be taken 
cum grano salts. 
In June 1918 the prophecy as to cater- 
pillars, made earlier in the year, was fulfilled. 
The plague was widespread, but was par- 
ticularly severe in the south and east of 
England and in Derbyshire and Westmor- 
land, where the caterpillars of the Antler- 
moth were rampant. Even houses were said 
to be invaded, and it was suggested that 
‘“ POULTRY should be turned loose in quan- 
tities to consume this valuable food.”’ In his 
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