406 ON DESTROYING VERMIN. 



POISONING VERMIN 



Clearing off the vermin by poison has been much in vogue of 

 late years. But, to say nothing of murdering all the dogs in 

 the neighbourhood, it seems a pity to treat the now rare and 

 interesting rovers of the desert like rats. This Turko-Spanish 

 plan of quietly putting them out of the way may find favour 

 with the man whose only pleasure in Highland sport consists in 

 butchering game. For my own part, I would rather trap one fine 

 specimen of the hill-fox, the wild-cat, or the marten, than shoot 

 one hundred brace of grouse. As to the mean pilfering Low- 

 land kinds, such as carrion-crows and magpies, there is no 

 danger of scarcity in that quarter, and no risk in poisoning 

 them, provided it is done by means of eggs. The keeper has 

 only to gum with a piece of white paper the chip in the shell 

 where the strychnine is inserted, and put two or three of 

 these poisoned eggs, a little shaded by the long grass, under 

 the trees where the magpies, &c. harbour. They will be 

 almost certain to see and devour them. 



THE END 



PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH 





