166 TOMTITS DESTROYED AS VERMIN. 



of giving parish rewards for the destruction of 

 various creatures included in the denomination of 

 vermin. In former times it may have been found 

 necessary to keep under or reduce the numbers 

 of many predaceous animals, which in a thickly 

 wooded country, with an inferior population, might 

 have been productive of injury ; and we even find 

 parliamentary statutes enacted for this purpose : 

 but now, however, our losses by such means have 

 become a very petty grievance ; our gamekeepers 

 do their part in removing pests of this nature, and 

 the plough and the axe leave little harbour for the 

 few that escape ; and thus we war on the smaller 

 races of creation, and call them vermin. An item 

 passed in one of our late churchwardens 1 accounts 

 was, " for seventeen dozen of tomtits' heads !" 

 In what evil hour, and for what crime, this poor 

 little bird (parus caeruleus) could have incurred 

 the anathema of a parish, it is difficult to con- 

 jecture. I know hardly any small animal that 

 lives a more precarious life than the little blue 

 tomtit. Indeed it is marvellous how any of the 

 insectivorous birds, that pass their winter with 

 us, are supplied with food during inclement 

 seasons, unless they have greater powers of ab- 

 stinence than we are aware of : but our small 

 birds are generally much more active than those 

 of a larger bulk ; the common wren is all anima- 

 tion, its actions and movements bespeak hilarity 



