2 
FOREWORD 
who have kept aloof we find Italy, a State of most 
extraordinary importance. 
The constant decrease of birds useful to agricul- 
ture, and the corresponding increase in the number 
of destructive insects, called attention to the necessity 
for an international convention for the protection of 
the former as far back as 1868, a date contempor- 
aneous with the revival of constitutionalism in Hun- 
gary; and, as a result of the progress of events, the 
constitutional Hungarian governments were among 
the first to take the initiative, using their influence 
more than once to provoke a decisive issue. 
This fact in itself is sufficient to justify the deter- 
mination of the constitutional Hungarian Minister 
for Agriculture to publish the story of the develop- 
ment of the cause, in the form of an historical sketch ; 
choosing the form of a sketch for the simple reason 
that the documents treating of the negotiations which 
have lasted for more than a generation, and are often 
of a confidential nature, are as yet inaccessible. This 
fact must serve as an apology for any deficiencies 
of the present work, deficiencies that it is left to the 
historians of a later age to supply. 
The publication of this sketch was, however, impe- 
rative in order to collect the moments and results 
of the long protracted and often interrupted nego- 
tiations and present them from a uniform point of 
view: at the same time it displays the deficiencies, 
thus rendering a service to the cause by pointing 
