238 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



the housing question has been (too literally) a burning one with 

 them for some time past. I have often been urged to sweep away 

 about a dozen old pollard ash trees — partly hollow and with many 

 holes in them — on the ground that they are useless, " only suck the 

 ground," and would make a lot of firewood. I always feel that 

 obstinate silence on the subject is better understood than the only 

 reason I could give for leaving them standing ! Whatever the real 

 cause or causes of the present scarcity of the Corn-Crake in parts of 

 England may be, I do not think the use of mowing-machines is one. 

 The mowing-machine was in use many years before the scarcity of 

 the birds was noticed. Corn-Crakes were common down to 1885, 

 after which the falling-off was more or less sudden, not gradual. 

 And I should think that nests w^ere more likely to be mowm out in 

 the days of the scythe, when mowing generally began earlier. I do 

 not remember hearing much of old Corn-Crakes being killed here 

 either by the scythe or the machine, and should think the rattle of 

 the latter would be more likely to warn the bird to leave her nest 

 than the gentle swish of the scythe. But I do think that telegraph- 

 wires may have had a good deal to do with the decrease, by the 

 destruction of the old birds on their arrival in the spring. For no 

 birds suffer more in this way than the Crake family. I attribute to 

 the wires also the greater scarcity nowadays of the Spotted Crake, 

 which I have often known killed by the wires in years gone by. I 

 do not think protection by law would have the least effect — here at 

 all events. I never once remember hearing of a Corn Crake's nest 

 being found here unless it had been mown out ; and when mown out 

 no further harm could result from taking the eggs. It would be far 

 better to take them than to leave them for the Books to eat, and so 

 encourage the latter in the very bad habit they have got into of 

 searching every field as soon as the grass or clover is down for nests 

 and eggs. Then, as to shooting the birds in the autumn, I can only 

 say that we have as many of these passing migrants as ever. They 

 evidently hail from some distant locality where the bird still breeds 

 in numbers, and shooting them has no effect whatever on the 

 breeding stock in this part of the country. The idea that protection 

 is a remedy in all cases for the present-day scarcity or the growing 

 scarcity of a bird has been overdone, and is, I hope, an exploded 

 notion. Protection has not saved the Stork in Holland. Take the 

 case of Bay's Wagtail. I took a long walk in the Cherwell Valley 

 one day in May, and I saw one of these birds. Some years ago I 

 should have seen — I feel sure — a dozen pairs, perhaps more. The 



