20 
OENERALIA 
Birds and Man. 
The third element of destruction is supplied by man, the 
most conscious and at the same time the most pitiless of 
beings. 
The routes of the birds of passage from the Southern 
regions of Europe right up to Moscow are inhabited by Latin, 
Southern Slavs, Levantine, Turkish, Greek and South Russian 
races, all of whom are ornithophages i. e. bird-eaters, whose 
devices and tools for catching birds are naturally varied and 
of advanced structure. There are, particularly, some nets of 
gigantic proportions well fitted to the destruction of birds 
in masses. 
We know that in some places the destruction of birds is 
on the decrease, that Spain is trying to mitigate the evil by 
influencing the youth for good, and has signed the Inter- 
national Convention just as France and Greece have done: 
but the real improvement, if it is to come at all, is reserved 
for the future. The perfection of the means of communication 
has made the transport of live prey easy, a fact that has 
enabled the masses of birds caught to be carried far away 
to the capitals of Central Europe, thus creating an extremely 
profitable branch of commerce. Consequently bird-catching 
has passed beyond the Mediterranean; and, on the. northern 
shores of Africa it is not savages or semisavages, but Euro- 
peans settled there who plant their nets to catch the bird of 
passage, transporting the masses of wretched prisoners to 
the continent of Europe, there to serve as delicacies on the 
tables of those whose one ambition is to satisfy the cravings 
of the inner man. 
Even the erections raised by man for his own and his 
fellows' protection claim hecatombs of birds of passage, — 
we mean, of course, the lighthouses which, while guiding 
