BIRDS IN CORNISH VILLAGE 297 



said it resulted from the action of the sparrows 

 in ousting them from their nests and nesting- 

 sites. But we know the true cause of the decline 

 of these two species, the best loved and best pro- 

 tected of all birds in Britain, not even excepting 

 robin redbreast. The French Government, in re- 

 sponse to representations on this matter from our 

 Foreign Office, have caused enquiries to be made 

 and have found that our swallows are being de- 

 stroyed wholesale in France during the autumn 

 migration, and have promised to put a stop to 

 this deplorable business.^ They do not appear to 

 have done so, since the promise was made three 

 years ago, and I can say from my own observa- 

 tion in the south and west countries that the de- 

 cline has continued and that we have never had 

 so few swallows come to us as in the present 

 summer of 19 16. 



The daw — to return to that subject — has al- 

 ways been regarded as an injurious species, and 

 down to a quarter of a century ago every farm 

 lad in possession of a gun shot it in the interests 

 of the henwife, even as he had formerly shot 

 the kite, a common British species and a familiar 

 feature in the landscape down to the early years 



