VoI.XXXVIIl 



1920 



J Henshaw, In Memoriam: William Brewster. 11 



warblers and vireos had grown up, and the shrubbery loving species 

 had shifted their quarters elsewhere. But the number of par- 

 tridges, for instance, had not increased over the original eight or 

 ten, although each year they nested and reared most, if not all, 

 their young. For many years also a pair of great crested flycatchers 

 nested in the cavity of a certain apple tree and every year brought 

 out a brood of young. Nevertheless only one pair came back each 

 spring, and he was unable to find any in the surrounding territory. 

 So it was with other species. Brewster's explanation in the case 

 of the partridges was that the old birds, with the authority of 

 vested rights, drove away the younger ones which, had they been 

 allowed to remain, would have overstocked the place according to 

 their own formula. But he found it difficult to thus explain the 

 failure of increase in bird life generally on the farm. He was 

 decidedly of the opinion, however, that his experiment proved that 

 to increase the number of small birds in a given area one must at 

 least do police duty and destroy the predacious birds and mammals, 

 large and small. And this he pointed out had been the experience 

 on the large game estates of England and Scotland, where no small 

 part of the keeper's business is to keep down the vermin. 



Brewster greatly regretted that all interest in his Concord place 

 was destined to lapse when he was through with it, and he fre- 

 quently debated some possible use it might be put to. At one time 

 he thought of offering it to the town of Concord, but deemed that 

 its remoteness from the town center would militate against its 

 usefulness as a local park. He also discussed its availability for a 

 duck and game breeding place, or for a bird refuge. But its avail- 

 ability for any of these uses, for one reason or another, seemed 

 questionable, and finally in despair of finding a promising scheme, 

 he dropped consideration of it. 



Throughout the earlier years of his life Brewster was a keen and 

 enthusiastic sportsman. When a boy in the high school, dawn 

 often found him sculling his skiff over the placid surface of the 

 near-by Fresh Pond in quest of waterfowl. He was a good shot 

 and cherished his gun and dog with an abiding love. He was rarely 

 without a serviceable pointer or setter, which, more often than not, 

 he himself had trained. He never wholly outgrew his love for sport 

 and one of the last pictures of him that lingers in my memory was as 



