xiv PREFACE 



have awakened a new and keener sympathy with 

 animal life, and specially with birds. But much 

 remains to be done. In particular, it must be 

 remembered that much that I have said in de- 

 nunciation of the pole- trap, may, mutatis mutandis > 

 be said, in lesser degree, of other modes, which are 

 still in full employment, of capturing or killing wild 

 animals. 



The heart of my book, the germ from which 

 most of it has been developed, is to be found, if I 

 mistake not, in the chapter on " The Old Thatched 

 Rectory and its Birds." In the rapid changes of 

 the years, it may soon be said with only too much 

 truth even in the county of Dorset, which knew 

 the value of Stafford Rectory and its associations 

 best in the words of one of the most exquisitely 

 pathetic poems ever written, that by Cowper "on 

 the receipt of his mother's picture out of Norfolk " : 



" Tis now become a history little known 

 That once we called the pastoral-house our own." 



But short-lived memories do not necessarily 

 make good influences to be short-lived also ; and, 

 if I may be allowed to do so, I would thankfully 

 acknowledge, with all filial reverence, that if there 

 be anything in this book which, in spite of all 



