140 GAME PKESERVERS A.'NJ) BIRD PRESERVERS. 



tion of some confidential person, or if tliey gave 

 their tenants notice that their leases would not 

 be renewed if they did not manage to bum the 

 heather as it is bimit in other parts of Scotland, 

 it would treble the stock of grouse. 



And let them take measures to find out if 

 the grouse on their estates are allowed to Hve 

 to breed. It does not follow that they are 

 allowed because a man who is called a game- 

 keeper lives on some part of the estate. 



As a single instance of the difference this 

 makes, we may mention that we knew there 

 were more than twenty brace in March on the 

 beat the falcons cleared for us in 1871. Yet 

 we found but fifteen of these birds ahve in 

 August, and with only one late-hatched brood 

 among them. To effect this ruin these hawks 

 had only in the four months to kill twenty- 

 five birds — about three a month to each 

 hawk. There were neither crows nor any 

 other vermin in that part of the country. Had 

 these twenty brace bred in peace we should 



