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BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



own words, finds far greater pleasure in watching 

 the movements and habits of the rarer species 

 than in shooting them. But such gamekeepers 

 are as unique as the praiseworthy taxidermist of 

 Manchester who, having lately received a Hoopoe 

 to stuff, exhibited it in his window with the notice : 

 " A rare bird, which ought never to have been 

 shot, but some people will kill anything." Is it to 

 be expected that the gamekeeper should refuse his 

 gratuity or the bird-stufifer his work? It is not 

 they who are the principals in the slaughter of 

 rare birds, which, legal or illegal, goes on 

 perpetually. 



Rare Birds. 



Among recent records in the newspapers of the 

 killing of rare birds are the following : — 



A pair of Bearded Tits freed pheasants), at 

 Burley Fishponds, near Oakham. This species is 

 said by Country Life to " have undoubtedly in- 

 creased since the Wild Birds Protection Acts have 

 been enforced, even in their present imperfect 

 manner," but it is one of the scarcest of British 

 birds, and almost confined to Norfolk. It is not 

 protected in Rutland. 



Great Northern Diver, shot on the Kennet, near 

 Hungerford, and exhibited in a taxidermist's shop 

 in Newbury. 



A Merlin, shot by a gamekeeper near Wirks- 

 worth. Exceedingly rare so far south as Derby- 

 shire. 



A Hawfinch, shot on Portobello beach, where the 

 species had not been seen for four years. 



Golden Eagle, shot in Groveley Woods ; the first 

 seen in Wiltshire, and said to have proved a 

 danger to the lambs. Added to the collection of 

 the owner of the property, who, according to a 

 morning paper, "about fifteen years ago secured 

 two fine ospreys while fishing in the river which 

 runs past Wilton House." 



Horned Owl in Hampshire. 



" It may be mentioned," says the Shooting 

 Times (Dec. 31st), "that the Kingfisher, Dipper, 

 and Heron are being destroyed wholesale by the 

 water-bailiffs in the Ribble valley." These birds 

 are not protected in Lancashire during the winter. 



Educational Work. 



Writing to the Society in reference to the great 



need for education on the subject of bird-life, in 



order that Bird Protection may be adequately 



dealt with, Sir llerewald Wake says : — 



" To arrive at efficacious legislation we must 

 educate the growing generation. The solid and 

 impervious crust of sheer ignorance of some 99 per 

 cent, of all classes alike on matters of fact which 

 ought to be common knowledge is what militates 

 against the survival of our most interesting and 

 useful forms of bird life. If we can catch the 

 voters and M.P.'s to be, young enough, no cage 

 birds will be kept that are not bred in cages, and 

 no women or girls will wear bird feathers, a.d. 2005 ; 

 and such of om fenc natures as have survived will 



be accorded some chance, of further continuance. 

 In the meantime we must do all we can to prevent 

 the change in our cruel and senseless habits and 

 customs coming too late, and the whole country 

 being given up to noxious weeds and destructive 

 insects. So I wish the Society every success, and 

 trust that it will be doing all it can by circulars and 

 lectures and so forth to enlighten the schoolboys 

 and girls, not only in the public elementary schools 

 but in all schools, as opportunities occur or are 

 made." 



Birds and Boys. 



The Poet Laureate, in his speech at the Society's 

 Annual Meeting, spoke of the necessity for giving 

 boys a genuine interest in the habits and ways and 

 almost human passions of birds if they are to be 

 weaned from nest-breaking. How successfully this 

 may be done is illustrated by many little stories 

 from our Bird and Tree centres, and by the example 

 of the School of Tean, in Staffordshire, where our 

 local Hon. Secretary, Mr. Masefield, has recently 

 been lecturing. The master mentioned that he 

 had been able so far to interest his scholars in 

 bird-life that there was, last summer, a flycatcher's 

 nest on a hinge of one of the school doors and four 

 or five nests of thrushes and blackbirds in the 

 school grounds, while a pair of rooks had started 

 a rookery in the trees in the playground. From 

 Hook, in Hampshire, we hear of a tit building 

 regularly in the school pump, and rearing its young. 



"Ospreys." 



A lying rumour of unknown origin appears 

 recently to have been set afloat to the effect that 

 the Duchess of Portland had been seen in the 

 Park wearing an " osprey." No one with any 

 knowledge of the Duchess, and of the warm 

 interest taken by her in the Society for the Protec- 

 tion of Birds, of which she has been President 

 for the past fourteen years, would for an instant 

 imagine that Her Grace would either wilfully 

 infringe one of the rules of the Society, or that she 

 would allow herself to be imposed upon by the 

 trumped-up story of "artificial" plumes, which, if 

 excuses are to be believed, still leads many credu- 

 lous women to support the trade. The Society is 

 authorised to give emphatic contradiction to the 

 story. " I am indignant about the osprey," the 

 Duchess writes, " I have never possessed one in 

 my life, nor had the slightest desire to do so. 

 Personally, I have always thought them very 

 uninteresting and ugly in a hat." 



Ostrich-farming. 



Another story, to which a number of papers have 

 given currency, doubtless with the best intentions, 

 relates to alleged cruelty in ostrich-farming. So 



