15 



The Committee came to the conclusion that numerous species 

 of birds are being recklessly slaughtered, and that while many 

 are being greatly reduced in numbers, others are in danger of being 

 actually exterminated ; that the Bill would be notonly of general 

 advantage, but would also render more effective the legislation of 

 India, of Australia and of the United States ; that the provisions 

 of the Bill are such as can be carried out in practice and without 

 difficulty by the Public Departments concerned ; and that the 

 Bill should be made the basis of representations to other Govern- 

 ments in order to induce them to pass similar laws. 



This Bill proposes to prohibit the possession for the purpose 

 of sale or exchange of the plumage or skin of any wild bird 

 imported into the United Kingdom. Exemptions are made in 

 respect of ostrich feathers and eider-down, of specimens for 

 museums, etc., of feathers for making fishing-flies, and of wild 

 birds imported as food. It passed the House of Lords on July 

 21st, 1908, and was introduced into the House of Commons on 

 July 22nd, by Lord Robert Cecil, but did not reach the second 

 reading before the end of the Session.* 



Bills with the same object have since been introduced into 

 the House of Commons by Sir William Anson, Mr. Ramsay 

 Macdonald, and Mr. Percy Alden, and have been blocked. 



This, in briefest form, is the history of the Plumage question, 

 a history the public is now requested to overlook on the hypothesis 

 that everything was really quite different from what it was repre- 

 sented to be ; that everything is entirely different now from 

 what it used to be ; and that birds are not decreasing, but increas- 

 ing, on account of the proceedings of plume-hunters. 



* For text of Bill see Appendix, p. 72. 



