Canary Societies, and Close and Open Shows. 405 



RECEIVING AND STAGING THE BIRDS. On the day 

 announced for the receipt of the birds yon should be in 

 attendance at the place of exhibition at such times as birds 

 may arrive; this you will ascertain on reference to a railway 

 time-table giving the arrivals of the trains. One of the com- 

 mittee, or some duly authorised person specially appointed, 

 and armed with an authority in writing duly signed by the 

 secretary and dated, should be in attendance at the railway 

 station to receive the birds and have them forwarded to the 

 place of exhibition with the least possible delay. As soon as 

 they arrive they should be opened out, and the secretary or 

 one of the committee-men should chalk upon each cage at 

 the top the number that is opposite the name of the exhibitor 

 in the consecutive column. The object in doing this is to 

 save much time in packing for the return journey. 

 Numbered labels would be better than chalked numbers, 

 as the latter are liable to get rubbed off or defaced. By 

 adopting this plan, all that is necessary for the working 

 members of the committee to do is to go through the 

 different classes and pick out all the cages having the same 

 numbers, and place them together; they should then be 

 checked off by the secretary, assistant-secretary, or some 

 member of the committee who may have been specially 

 selected for this duty, and finally given over to one of the 

 persons who have been appointed as packers. On reference 

 to the index, the number of exhibits and the class numbers 

 are readily seen, and can with the least possible labour be 

 checked off. The saving of time gained by the adoption of 

 this method, to say nothing of the prevention of errors, is 

 almost incredible. During the many years that I took an 

 active part in shows, as secretary or otherwise, I never 

 remember a single occurrence of a bird being wrongly sent, 

 or one being left behind, and I have known instances where 

 from three to four hundred birds have been carefully packed 

 and sent off within three hours after the closing of the show. 

 If one is wanting to complete the entry, the secretary can 

 easily ascertain which bird is missing by referring to the class 

 numbers in the index at the end of the name and address of 



