BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



73 



before the Bench objected that the magistrates' 

 finding "would make even Hurlingham impossible." 



Birds of the District. 



Most bird-lovers and flower-lovers are surprised 

 at times by the vague notions their acquaintances 

 possess regarding the number and names of the 

 common wild birds and flowers of their own 

 neighbourhood. On the other hand, even ornitho- 

 logists will view with admiration the list of no 

 fewer than 67 species of birds drawn up by " Old 

 Finchleian," as having occurred in the London 

 suburb of Finchley within the last three years. 

 The list, published in "The Finchleian" for Nov- 

 ember, 1904, includes some single records, but 

 omits five species seen to pass over without settling. 

 The Long-tailed Tit is said to be increasing, and 

 the Kingfisher, Nightjar, and Sand- Martin to occur 

 regularly. When we go further afield such lists 

 naturally lengthen, and Captain Lindsay, of Sutton 

 Courtenay (one of the prettiest of Berkshire 

 Thames-side villages), sends a list of 90 species 

 observed by himself during the last few years 

 within an area of 30 acres around his house. Of 

 these the Nightingale, Kingfisher, Goldcrest, and 

 Tree-Sparrow are increasing ; others, including 

 Kestrel, Magpie, Jay, Wryneck, Nightjar, Curlew, 

 Sandpiper, Wheatear, Wood-wren, Bullfinch, and 

 Hawfinch, are not known to nest within the area. 

 The Cirl Bunting, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, 

 Dipper, Great Crested Grebe, Snipe, Land-rail, and 

 Water-rail are other interesting records. 



Agricultural Conference. 



The King of Italy convened an International 

 Agricultural Conference to meet at Rome on May 

 28th, and it is hoped that increased protection of 

 birds useful to agriculture and horticulture will 

 result. The British delegates were His Excellency 

 the Right Hon. Sir Edwin Egerton, the Earl of 

 Jersey, the Earl of Minto, Sir T. H. Elliott, and 

 Mr. T. P. Gill. 



Ornithological Congress. 



The Fourth International Congress takes place 

 as announced in our last number, June 12th to 17th, 

 at the Imperial Institute, South Kensington. The 

 programme includes a conversazione at the Natural 

 History Museum, a reception by the Lord Mayor 

 of London, and, in the following week, excursions 

 to Woburn Abbey, Cambridge, and Flamborough. 

 It is proposed to give some account of it in the 

 next issue of Bird Notes and News, especially 

 of the papers touching on Bird Protection. 



"METHODS OF 

 GAME PRESERVING." 



Mr. Bosworth Smith writes to the Times (May 

 30th, 1905) to call attention to a new compound, 

 advertised in a catalogue of " shooting requisites," 

 which the ingenuity of the gamekeeper and his 

 friends has devised to take the place of the 

 condemned pole-trap, and which appears to be, 

 if anything, the more abominable invention of 

 the two. 



" The object, it is to be observed, is the exter- 

 mination of some of the most interesting, the most 

 intelligent, the most beautiful of English birds, the 

 hawk, the magpie, and the jay among them. And 

 what are the means ? ' Snarglu ' — notice the 

 appropriate hideosity of the name — is an intensely 

 adhesive compound from which no feathered 

 creature which once touches it can escape. A 

 magpie or a jay is to be caught by its means upon 

 her nest ; her feathers are to be further daubed 

 with it by hand, and she is then to be let loose 

 to crawl about as best she may in her maimed 

 condition, or she is to be tethered to the ground 

 with a peg or string a yard long. When others 

 of her kind, attracted by her struggles and moved 

 by that sad and strange instinct — perhaps in their 

 case a merciful one in the end — which leads even 

 men of the baser sort sometimes to trample on 

 those who are down, come mobbing round her, 

 they are, in their turn, caught and paralysed by 

 the murderous compound, and are then either dis- 

 posed of at once by the gamekeeper, proud of what 

 the circular calls the ' satisfactory eventualities,' 

 or are let loose to drag out a death-in-life, and to 

 deal out, ere they die themselves, death to those 

 who live. W ill any high-minded English gentle- 

 man, will any true sportsman allow his gamekeeper 

 to swell the slaughter of the annual battue by 

 such calculating cruelties ? Englishmen pride 

 themselves on their humanity. I am persuaded 

 therefore that the iniquity of 'Snarglu' needs only 

 to be exposed to be as unanimously condemned 

 and abolished. 



" Let not the Ornithological Congress, which 

 meets in London from all parts of the world next 

 month, and one of the main objects of which is 

 the preservation of all birds, learn that in England 

 the preservation of game is regarded by even 

 a small minority among game preservers as so 

 sacrosanct an end that it justifies such means." 



BIRDS AND AGRICULTURE. 



An important debate on the economic value of 

 birds in their relation to agriculture took place at 

 the London Farmers' Club on April 3rd, 1905. 

 The subject was introduced by the Rev. H. H. 

 Slater, F.Z.S., M.B.O.U., of Thornhaugh, North- 

 ants, who read a paper on "Wild Birds and the 

 Farm." 



