12 JANUARY. 



has felt the sharp salutation of his desperate 

 shot, and shall do again ; for if the public does 

 not take warning, he will not. In farm-yards, 

 trains of corn are laid, and scores of sparrows, 

 finches, etc. are slaughtered at a shot. Even 

 the school-boy is bent upon their destruction. 

 His trap, made of four bricks and a few pegs, 

 is to be seen in every garden, and under every 

 rick, and with a sieve, a stick, and a string, 

 drawn through a window or a keyhole, he is 

 standing ready to pounce upon them. Not 

 even night, with its deepest shades, can protect 

 them at this cruel time. They are roused from 

 their slumbers in the sides of warm stacks by a 

 sieve or a net, fixed upon a pole, being clapped 

 before them. Those which roost in hedges 

 and copses are aroused by beating the trees and 

 bushes, at the same time that they are dazzled 

 with the glare of a torch, and, flying instinc- 

 tively towards the light, are knocked down and 

 secured. This is called in some counties bird- 

 moping ; and in this manner are destroyed 

 great numbers of pheasants, thrushes, black- 

 birds, besides innumerable small birds. With 

 all these enemies, and these various modes of 



