BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



37 



take an interest in the birds, the latest letter re- 

 ceived from her being- written only a very few 

 weeks before her death. Sir Henry M. Stanley, 

 M.P., the intrepid explorer, became a Life Associate 

 in 1894, before either the G.C.B. or the M.P. was 

 attached to his name, but when his fame was as 

 world-wide as though the whole alphabet had 

 followed it. Miss Cobbe died on April 5th, and 

 Sir H. M. Stanley on May 9th, 1904. 



Lantern Slides. 



A HANDSOME gift of lantern slides of British birds 

 has been offered to our Society by Mrs. Sennett, 

 through Mr. Dutcher, the Chairman of the National 

 Committee of Audubon Societies of the United 

 States of America. The slides were purchased in 

 England by the late Mr. Sennett some years ago, 

 and form a valuable collection. The offer has been 

 accepted by the Council with cordial thanks. 



The City Pigeons. 



In consequence of the many rumours respecting 

 a proposed onslaught on the pigeons of the City 

 of London, and their supposed unprotected con- 

 dition, the Society communicated with both the 

 Lord Mayor and the Commissioner of Police 

 respecting them. The replies received are of a 

 character eminently satisfactory to those who re- 

 joice in the presence of the birds in our busy 

 thoroughfares. " There is no foundation for the 

 statement referred to," is the answer from the 

 Police headquarters ; " nor is it the intention of 

 the City Authorities to destroy any of the City 

 pigeons. Any person found taking or killing the 

 birds in question will be prosecuted by the Police 

 under 24 & 25 Vic, c. 96." 



Bird and Tree Day. 



The total number of elementary schools entered 

 this season for the County Challenge Shields and 

 prizes which the Society is offering for competition 

 in six counties, is 137. It is to be hoped that the 

 ardour of teachers and children will not cool, and 

 that essays from every one of these schools will 

 be sent in by September 30th. 



A PLEA FOR A NATIONAL PARK. 



Mr. Charles Stewart strongly advocates in 

 the Nineteenth Century and After for May, 1904, 

 the establishment of a National Park for Scotland, 

 a park, that is, which shall not be simply a Hyde 

 Park, or even a Richmond Park (above all not a 



Richmond Park without its protected woods and 

 its reserves), but what the New Forest might con- 

 ceivably have been under wholly changed condi- 

 tions and untroubled by verderers or squatters, 

 rights or privileges : a smaller Yellowstone or rival 

 Yosemite. Its objects should be the preservation 

 in its wild state of a large tract of country pos- 

 sessing in a high degree natural beauty and 

 grandeur, and the strict preservation of specimens 

 of the indigenous fauna of our country : " the red 

 deer, the fallow deer, the roe deer, the hare, the 

 badger, the otter, the wildcat, the fox, and the 

 minor quadrupeds ; the capercailzie, the blackcock, 

 the muirfowl, the partridge, the golden eagle, the 

 raven, and all the glorious tribe of sea-eagle and 

 sea-hawk, and all the lesser native birds ; the 

 salmon, the sea-trout, the ferox, the grayling, the 

 yellow trout, et hoc genus omne." It should be of 

 not less than 20,000 acres, and might be 40,000 ; 

 the islands of Jura or Rum being suggested as not 

 impossible for the purpose. A capital of ,£30,000 

 to £50,000 would buy a suitable place. It might 

 be made to pay to some extent by the breeding 

 and sale of stags, the hatching of salmon and trout, 

 the sale of seedlings and saplings ; and it would 

 yield handsome dividends in the delight afforded 

 to a nation. 



" The direct advantage of preserving intact a large and 

 wild tract of country of great natural beauty ; the benefit 

 of preserving and improving the wild animals and birds 

 of our country, and of rescuing their genera and their 

 species from extinction . . . . ; the enormous and highly 

 prized boon which would be conferred upon zoologists, 

 ornithologists, ichthyologists, botanis r s, arboriculturists, 

 and all the honoured band of scientific folk, who are 

 struggling individually and through their learned societies 

 to maintain and extend the credit of our country in their 

 valuable branches of knowledge ; all these are plain and 

 direct benefits which would surely and promptly accrue 

 from the acquisition and maintenance of a National 

 Park." 



The Government that has the courage and the 

 spirit to undertake and carry through such a scheme 

 would, Mr. Stewart thinks, deserve and receive an 

 ample meed of gratitude. 



The same number of the review contains an 

 article on "Bird Life at Bingham's Melcombe," 

 the last of the entertaining series on bird-life 

 which Mr. Bosworth Smith has been writing and 

 all bird-lovers have been reading. 



THE PLUME TRADE. 



AT the feather sale at the Commercial Sale Rooms, 

 London, on April 19th, 1904, there were 161 packages 

 of osprey feathers, of varying quantities, these being 



