NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
401 
on soaking in water, I at once discerned to be black ants, in 
number snfficient to fill an egg cnp. Here, then, we find that 
the police of nature ordains that the ants should eat decaying 
vegetable matter, especially in fir woods, where their nests are 
frequently robbed for the sake of feeding young pheasants with 
tlie eggs. Mr. Jamracli imports large quantities of these eggs 
from the forests in Germany. 
May we not also learn a practical lesson from studying the 
habits of the woodpecker ? I frequently hear complaints that 
the pine forests of this country and Scotland are seriously injured 
by a beetle whicli bores into the sprouting tops of the pine-trees, 
and thereby does great mischief to woodland property. If the 
proprietors of the forests are so foolishly ignorant as to allow the 
woodpecker to be shot, it serves them right that their trees are 
injured ; when in the pretty harmless Avoodpeckers they have 
valuable servants who would, without being paid for their trouble, 
find out these insect pests on the pine-trees, and very quickly 
dig them out of their retreat by means of their sharp-pointed 
bayonet-shaped bills. Woodpeckers are getting gradually more 
and more scarce ; o\A'ners had better take the hint at once and 
preserv^e them, otherwise woodpeckers will soon be nearly, if not 
quite, exterminated. 
In November, 1875, I took from the stomach of a great spotted 
woodpecker, shot at Halstead, in Essex, a mature caterpillar, some 
two inches long, of the Leopard moth. This caterpillar is three 
years feeding or. the wood of the mountain ash and oak. Thus 
we see what an immense deal of good woodpeckers do in plan- 
tations. 
Teansport of BiKDS ON Board Ship, p. 108. — The captains 
of vessels have now found out means to bring over these soft- 
billed birds. 
Exportation of English Birds to Nfw Zealand.— On Satur- 
day Jan. 2, 1875, the ship Tintern A hhey sailed from the East 
India Docks with a most valuable consignment of British birds 
for New Zealand. The Canterbury Acclimatisation Society had 
sent Mr. Bills, j an., over to England to collect British birds to 
be turned out in New Zealand. Mr. Bills, who has been well 
trained in this matter by his father, who has been so successful 
in transporting birds to the antipodes, kindly invited me to in- 
spect his present lot previously to their being put on board ship. 
I found them in a room whicli literally speaking was choke-full 
of birds, and the clattering noise of the wings and feet on entering 
the room was very remarkable. 
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