92 A HANDBOOK FOR SOUTHPORT. 



plants once so abundant, which now are scarce. Much waste 

 and marshy land has been drained, and adapted to the 

 requirements of a constantly increasing population ; and 

 the birds, finding their breeding places destroyed, and their 

 feeding localities impoverished, have wisely betaken them- 

 selves elsewhere. There has also been much deliberate 

 destruction with the gun a form of persecution very often 

 unnecessary and cruel. Farmers and gamekeepers are now 

 happily becoming alive to the fact that birds such as kestrels 

 and owls are not only harmless, but useful ; their food 

 consisting chiefly of mice and other ground vermin. Where- 

 ever hawks have been ruthlessly shot down, to the almost 

 total extermination of their kind, agriculturists have sustained 

 heavy loss. So with the reckless slaughter of the smaller 

 descriptions of birds. The havoc made in orchards and 

 gardens, and upon farm land, is sometimes undeniably- 

 vexatious. But it is balanced by the enormous consumption 

 of insects, grubs and caterpillars. Look, also, at those 

 heaps of broken and excavated snail-shells upon the sand- 

 hills, the picked bones of their repast, left by the thrushes 

 and the blackbirds ; both of which, we may remember again, if 

 disposed to be very cross with them, about the nibbling of 4 the 

 cherries, are liable to be themselves eaten by their own 

 pursuers, and very often do get eaten. No policy is more 

 short-sighted than the persistent destruction of birds. It is 

 the opprobrium of the present day, and if not changed, will 

 induce results that, when too late, will be deplored. Severe 

 winters, not so much through the intensity of the cold, as the 

 diminution of the natural food supply, keep all in order, 

 taking the average of years, in regard to excessive increase. 



