CORRESPONDING SOCIETIES. old 



Mr. William (ji-ay (Belfast Naturalists' Field Club) said that Mrs. Hobsou 

 omitted to say that the motto of their club was ' Protection, not Obstruction,' 

 and that recently it gave a good example of this. For a number of years a pair 

 of birds, strangers to Ireland, had attempted to breed in the north, but were 

 prevented by a local collector, who had removed the eggs year by year. This past 

 summer the President of the Club had collected funds to be paid conditionally 

 on the successful hatching of the eggs. The result was that the young birds were 

 brought oft" and allowed to escape without being molested. 



Mr. John Hopkinson (Hertfordshire Natural History Society and Field Glub) 

 spoke as to the intelligent use by a member of his Society of the field-glass and 

 camera for the observation of rare birds in their breeding haunts, stating that he 

 had been careful not to divulge the sites. He read a letter which he had received 

 that morning, written on the suggestion of an Assistant at Kew Gardens, asking 

 for a number of roots of a rare local plant for medicinal purposes. His Society 

 had a stringent rule against rare plants being uprooted and rare birds and other 

 animals being killed, and this request would not be granted. 



The Eev. Ashington Biillen (S.E. Union of Scientific Societies) congra- 

 tulated Mrs. Hobson on her paper, and emphasised the need of educating public 

 opinion to protect rather than wantonly to destroy rare species. He instanced 

 the destruction of the hoopoe, of which one spring a pair was shot in the New 

 Forest and another (by a friend, who noticed it as a strange bird) in Lincoln- 

 shire. Somewhere about thirty years ago one collector took over nine hundred 

 Lulworth skippers in the limited habitat in which it is found : probably the species 

 is on the verge of extinction by this time. Such insatiate greed was worthy of 

 the strongest condemnation. About a quarter of a century ago (1880) the 

 Cornish chough was to be seen on St. Alban's (Aldhelm's) Head, in Dorset. He 

 liad heard the jackdaw credited with the disappearance of this species : it was 

 more probable that the charge should be laid at the door of the birds'-nester or 

 sportsman. He believed that the chough was nowhere to be found on the 

 South Coast nearer than Cornwall, and it was diminishing even there. 



Mr. Harold Wager (Leeds Naturalists' Club and Scientific Association) ex- 

 pressed the opinion that the collection of specimens for purposes of solving 

 definite scientific problems or for museum collections was no doubt necessary, 

 but that a sound knowledge of natural history, whether of animals or plants, 

 could be obtained without the indiscriminate and thoughtless collecting so often 

 indulged in. Local Societies could do much to prev^ent this by encouraging a 

 more scientific attitude towards collecting and by insisting upon the fact that 

 the study of the habits and life histories of the living organism in the field and 

 not the accumulation of dead specimens is the work of the true naturalist. 



Mrs. Hobson, in responding, said it was the needless collecting that ought to 

 be checked. Referring to Mr. Gray's remarks, she said that the bird mentioned 

 was the Red-throated Diver, which had laid its eggs for more than twenty years 

 in Donegal, only to be taken and sold to collectors ; but, thanks partly to the 

 Belfast Naturalists' Field Club, a sum of money had been spent in watching, and 

 for once the eggs had been saved from destruction. 



The Report of the Corresponding Societies Committee was distributed by the 

 Secretary, and it was decided to apply for a grant of 2ol. 



Second Meeting, September 8. 



The Meeting was presided over by Professor Grenville A. .T. Cole, \'ice- 

 Chairman. 



The Corresponding Societies Committee was represented by the Rev. J. O. 

 Bevan, Sir Edward Brabrook, Mr. J. Hopkinson, Mr. W. P. 1). Stebbing, and 

 Mr. W. Whitaker. 



The Vice-Chairman apologised for the absence of Professor Miers (who was 

 nnable, to his great regret, to be present), and in his name welcomed the dele- 

 gates to the second session. 



