If the Importation Act would not save a single bird, and if the 

 business would merely be transferred to a German port, feather- 

 traders would not trouble themselves greatly about it. That 

 they are fighting with might and main, and with every argument 

 on which they can lay hands, is proof that they are desperately 

 afraid of the effect on the whole Continent and on America of 

 such a law passing through the British Parliament. They know 

 that foreign legislatures would follow British example and that 

 the birds would be saved. 



At the International Ornithological Conference, held in Berlin 

 in May-June, 1910, an International Committee of Ornitho- 

 logists was formed, in order to consider the means for obtaining 

 international laws for the protection of birds killed for the plume- 

 market. The countries represented on the Committee are : 

 Great Britain, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, 

 Holland, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Russia, Sweden, Switzerland* 

 and the United States of America. 



A Colonial Office Committee was appointed by the Colonial 

 Secretary (Lord Crewe) in 1910, to investigate the facts with 

 reference to the birds of the British Empire. The Committee 

 consists of Dr. Sidney Harmer, F.R.S., Mr. W. R. Ogilvie- 

 Grant, and Mr. C. E. Fagan , for the Natural History Museum ; 

 Mr. H. J. Read, Mr. G. W. Johnson, and Mr. R. E. Stubb, for 

 the Colonial Office ; the Hon. E. S. Montagu, Parliamentary 

 Under -Secretary for India, and Mr. Percy Illingworth, for the 

 Board of Trade. 



A petition from the self-governing Colonies of South Africa, 

 Australia, and New Zealand, calling attention to the manner 

 in which Colonial ordinances for the protection of plume-birds 

 are frustrated by illicit export, was presented to the Colonial 

 Secretary (Mr. Harcourt) in November by Mr. Buckland, 



