3634 The Zoologist — August, 1873. 



what he adds immediately after, as it misrepresents them, seems 

 scarcely consistent; especially after I had explained the grounds 

 on which I thought the Act to be " objectionable in principle." 

 Whether conceived by sportsmen or not, the Wild Fowl Protection 

 Bill was, as it appeared to me, virtually a Game Act, and un- 

 doubtedly I hold all Game Acts to be objeclionable in principle, 

 though under certain circumstances tolerable in practice; objec- 

 tionable, too, the Wild Birds Protection Act seemed to me, 

 because, among other reasons, its aim was to prohibit unduly the 

 liberty of the subject in the destroying even of noxious birds. 

 Now I cannot see that the regulation in Deut. xxii. 6, 7, has the 

 remotest suspicion of being either a Game Act or an undue inter- 

 ference with the liberty of the subject. I do not therefore for a 

 moment admit my argument agaiust the Wild Fowl Protection 

 Bill and the Wild Birds Protection Act to be equally an argument 

 against the Mosaic prohibition : this prohibition was against ruthless 

 extermination and cruelty; but it is yet quite consistent in its 

 principle, with the fullest necessary liberty to keep noxious birds 

 within bounds, provided cruelty and ruthless extermination are 

 avoided. These are, it seems to me, the sole points to which 

 legislation ought to be, or can be, directed in these days: on 

 these points a full and free discussion cannot be otherwise than 

 beneficial ; and it will, I think, greatly conduce towards the 

 object we all have in view — i.e. the reasonable, just, and humane 



treatment of birds. 



O. P.-Cambridge. 

 Bloxworth Rectoi-y, July 3, 1873. 



Notes from the Brighton Aquarium. 

 By W. Savtlle Kent, Esq. 



1. The Intellect of Porpoises. — A single visit to the Brighton 

 Aquarium would suffice to convince a recent correspondent, 

 Mr. Mattieu Williams, that the intellect of the porpoise, as fore- 

 shadowed by its convoluted brain, exceeds, beyond comparison, 

 that of the cod-fish or any other representatives of the piscine 

 race. Of the two specimens now inhabiting the largest tank iu 

 the building, over one huudred feet long, the first-comer so readily 

 accommodated itself to its altered conditions, that on the second 

 day it took its food, smelts and sprats, from its keeper's hand, and 



