on Eccentricities of Bird Importation. 265


it never arrives in the London market. The Japanese White-eye

or Spectacle-bird is another instance ; it is extremely common in

Central Japan, is a familiar friend in every bird-shop, and has

reached the German bird-market in some numbers, but it does

not seem to come to us.


The recent importations of Birds of Paradise prove that

where collectors can be sent out to secure them, even those

species which are not familiar household pets among the natives

of a country can be obtained ; yet those most beautiful birds, the

little Fruit-doves of the genus Ptilopus, are among the rarest

birds to find their way even to our Zoological Gardens, although

they are commonly caged in some of the S. Pacific islands :

possibly their owners may value them highly and charge a pro-

portionately high price for them, but one would think that a few

cheap and showy mirrors or musical-boxes would tempt most

semi-civilized savages to give up that which they could easily

replace.


Possibly Fruit-pigeons may be shunned by the importer

under a false impression as to the difficulty of feeding them on

board ship ; but I believe these birds are very accommodating in

the matter of food, and in the absence of small fruits will do well

upon chopped potato and peameal, at any rate for a time: to say

the least, it would be well worth while to put it to the test.


When there are so many common and altogether delightful

birds which could easily be secured, the indifference of most of

our dealers to this fact is somewhat exasperating : surely a little

energy would pay them well. Doubtless many of these men are

content to buy from sailors and others returning from a voyage,

taking over and over again hundreds of the same species, which

arrive as regularly and with as little variation as occurs in the

well-known stereotyped soldier's collection of tropical insects,

hundreds of which cases of rubbish must be made up by the

natives of India and China and sold, at far more than their actual

value, to privates in our army.


A little trouble in distributing rough coloured sketches of

desirable birds, as guides to the native catchers, might do some

good ; but so long as dealers are willing to buy the common

Avadavat, Black-headed Maunikin and Pekin Nightingale at so



