io8 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



St* Giles-in-the-Fields* I came home with the local 

 guide-book in my pocket* It is now before me, and 

 this is what its writer says of the Thicket, the exten- 

 sive and beautiful common two miles from the town, 

 which belongs to Maidenhead, or, in other words, 

 to its inhabitants : " The Thicket was formerly 

 much infested by robbers and highwaymen* The 

 only remains of them to be found now are the 

 snarers of the little feathered songsters, who imprison 

 them in tiny cages and carry them off in large 

 numbers to brighten by their sweet sad sighs for 

 liberty the dwellers in our smoky cities/' 



On this point I consulted a bird-catcher, who had 

 spread his nets on the common for many years, and 

 he complained bitterly of the increasing scarcity of 

 its bird life* There was no better place than the 

 Thicket formerly, he said ; but now he could 

 hardly make his bread there* I presume that a 

 dozen men of his trade would be well able to drain 

 the country in the neighbourhood of the Thicket 

 of the greater portion of its bird life each year so 

 as to keep the songsters scarce* Will any person 

 maintain for a moment that the eight or nine thousand 

 inhabitants of Maidenhead, and the hundreds or 

 thousands inhabiting the surrounding country, could 

 not protect their song-birds from these few men, 

 most of them out of London slums, if they wished 

 or had the spirit to do so t 



