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BIRD LEGISLATION IN AUSTRALIA. 



BY THE 



Hon. Sir John Cockbubn, K.C.M.G., M.D. 



Although Queensland in 1877 passed an Act for the protec- 

 tion of native birds, the earlier laws relating to birds in 

 Australia are chiefly to be found among the Grame Acts. 



Birds were in the first instance protected not so much for 

 their own sake as for sporting and gastronomic ends. 



Their lives were preserved in order that more pleasure 

 might be derived from killing them. It was a case of cup- 

 board love, like that of the little girl who, watching the lambs 

 frisking in the meadow, exclaimed, " I do so love the little 

 lambs — cold with mint sauce ! " 



Later on economic considerations came into play. It was 

 fornici that birds were in many cases the best friends and 

 allies of the gardener and farmer, and readily entered into 

 profitable partnership with them. In passing an Act on one 

 occasion the results of practical experience were reinforced 

 by quotations from Longfellow's poem " Birds of Killing- 

 worth." 



Humane sentiment also joined hands with utility. No 

 creature a23peals so strongly to our tenderness as does a bird. 



It is the emblem of human aspiration. We do not covet 

 the limbs or integument of beast, reptile, or fish, but who has 

 not sighed for the wings of a dove ? Many motives therefore 

 converged towards the framing of special legislation for 

 birds. All the Acts were not, however, of a protective nature. 

 There was a notable exception. Side by side with measures 

 for the preservation of the class there ran Acts for the 

 destruction of the Sparrow. The equilibrium of life is less 

 stable in a new country than in an old. The limits of food 

 supply and natural enemies do not afford so rigid a check to 

 propagation, and consequently any newly-introduced form of 

 life may, under favouring conditions, run riot through the 

 land. The early settlers loved to surround their homes with 

 familiar objects of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. Enter- 

 prising colonists imported and turned loose Rabbits and 



