32 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



disturbed after a kill and return to an unfinished 

 feast. In trapping for magpies, the keeper ties a 

 rabbit's eye to the pan of his trap, which he covers 

 carefully with moss so that only the eye is visible ; 

 then the magpie swoops down ; unerringly, and with 

 great force, he drives his bill into the eye, and the 

 trap holds him fast. 



While usually building in high trees, some descend 

 to thick bushes, and from this has arisen a popular 

 idea that there are two sorts of magpies bush and 

 tree. The idea is hard to shake ; and it is argued 

 that the bush magpie is the smaller of the two. The 

 nest is always fortified with strong and ugly thorns ; 

 marauding crows or rooks would attack it at their 

 peril. Careful as they are to protect their own nests, 

 magpies have small respect for the sanctity of other 

 bird homes ; but though they are inveterate egg- 

 stealers, a good word is sometimes heard for their 

 usefulness in destroying slugs, rats, and field-mice. 



No solution has been found to the problem of a 

 substitute for the steel trap for rabbits and vermin. 



So the steel trap remains a painful necessity, 

 The as those know who have tried to keep great 



Trap 1 U numbers of rabbits within bounds. But 



steel traps are sometimes used where more 

 merciful ways of catching rabbits might serve as 

 well. Rabbit catchers who never think for them- 

 selves, but do things only because they have always 



