344 A SPRING AND SUMMER IN LAPLAND. 



that amateurs promise, paid men perform. It 

 seems easy enough for any man who is residing in 

 a tract where the birds breed all round him, to 

 procure a clutch of eggs and send them away; 

 and so it would be, perhaps, in Britain, vfhere no 

 man lives further than a few miles from a railway 

 station. But in these countries transport is not 

 so easy ; and although there is no trouble to pro- 

 cure the eggs, the trouble is to get them well to 

 England. 



There is a great doubt in my mind whether 

 eggs sent over from this country would incubate 

 when they reached England. But I see that 

 Thompson, in his " Natural History of Ireland, 35 

 mentions the fact of eggs, which had been partly 

 incubated, hatching off after they had been taken 

 twelve hours from the nest, but not longer. There 

 are two birds in this country which many English 

 sportsmen are desirous of obtaining — the willow 

 grouse and the hazel grouse. "Why don't they sub- 

 scribe £100, and send over for a season a regular 

 gamekeeper who is used to the management and 

 rearing young birds ? He would have no trouble 

 to obtain what he wanted, and, doubtless, then the 

 affair would be managed, and a good breeding 

 stock would be obtained. £100 ought to pay all 

 expenses ; and what would this sum be when 

 divided among a dozen of our rich game preser- 



