xii PREFACE 



since my paper on owls was first published, been abol- 

 ished by law. I have thought it well, however, 

 in spite of the passing of the Bill, to leave the 

 passages in which I denounced it exactly as they 

 originally stood, and that for two reasons. First, 

 because in the eyes of lovers of birds, they may, 

 perchance, have acquired, as a humble contributing 

 cause to so happy a result, some little additional his- 

 torical interest of their own ; and, secondly, and 

 much more important, because to pass a Bill into 

 law is, unfortunately, not the same thing as to see 

 it carried out, especially when the means of evading 

 it are comparatively easy, and when the permanent 

 forces of ignorance, of selfishness, of laissez faire, 

 or of indifference to animal-suffering as is the 

 case with some game-preservers, and many, or 

 indeed most gamekeepers are arrayed on the other 

 side. Much must depend, henceforward, on the 

 zeal and energy of the county magistrates, of the 

 county councils, of the county police, if the law is 

 to be properly carried out. Almost as I write, I 

 hear from a brother who has just returned from 

 Scotland that he saw, on the open moor, a pole-trap, 

 "naked and yet not ashamed," in full and hideous 

 operation there ; and, only a month or two ago, 

 I heard from a friend on the borders of the 



