540 
president’s address. 
as regards many other species, I think the fact has not been 
so generally acknowledged by naturalists as it should be, for it is 
assuredly one of very considerable significance to all who busy 
themselves with the study of our fauna, and therefore to the 
members of a society like this. I am much afraid that ornithologists 
do not sufficiently perceive the imminent risk that a great many 
of our most interesting birds run of being exterminated. The 
Acts of Parliament to which I have just referred are doing perhaps 
the best that under all circumstances can be done in behalf of the 
species which they expressly have in view, and it is possible 
that by no legal process could protection be extended to other 
groups — to one, at least, which I have specially in mind, and 
to us as naturalists this group is one of very great interest, 
— particularly to members of this society, who have the 
advantage, owing to the liberality of one of its most distinguished 
and oldest members, of easy access to the Museum, where it is so 
well represented. That group is the one generally known as the 
“ Birds of Prey,” and it is among its members that I have observed 
the greatest contrast between what I remember of them prior to 
1859 and my experience since 1883. My memory, of course, does 
not carry me back to the days when the larger Birds of Prey 
abounded, or were even not very rarely seen, though I can recall to 
mind the observation of a Kite in one adjoining county, and of 
a Buzzard and of an Eagle in another. But the sight of one or 
more of the smaller species — a Merlin, a Kestrel, or a Sparrow 
Hawk — was, at the proper season, an almost every day occurrence 
up to the time of my leaving the country in 1859. Kow I may 
travel the whole length and breadth of England, to say nothing of 
Scotland, at any time of the year, without seeing any one of the 
FalconidcB, and the contrast in that respect is very marked. It is 
just the same if I take a walk into any part of the country ; and in 
the five years since my return, I am sure I have not seen, though 
always on the look out, many more than a score of examples of all 
these three species together. It is plain, to my eyes, that in this 
island the extirpation of the smaller Birds of Prey is almost as 
fully accomplished as was that of the larger kinds some years ago. 
