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Salthouse were gathered by scores to make puddings and pancakes, 
and the gunners actually unloaded their big guns at the birds, in 
Avanton sport. At Hempstead, by Holt, the Stone Curlew’s eggs 
were gathered in like manner, and the old ones sl^t, and the 
records as to the amount of Lapwing’s eggs, yeiirly gathered in the 
fens, as well as “breck” lands, is scarcely credible by modern natural- 
ists. So long, of course, as an impenetrable swamp, in places, 
foimed a natural barrier between themselves and the egg gatherers, 
but little harm -was done, and their numbers were not sensibly 
diminished; but when these areas became contracted, the birds 
less numerous, and the eggs .sought for with still greater avidity, 
extinction became an inevitable result. Such, in degree, is the 
condition at the present time of various species, slowly but simdy 
hastening to a like end, so far as this county is concerned. With 
our rarer species of birds (and the same remarks will apply as well 
to insects and idants) the more nearly are they exterminated in 
any British locality, the higher the price offered by the collector, 
and the greater the inducement to marshmen and others to procure 
all they can. Strangers from a distance, iis well as local collectors, 
hasten the finale, and some, not content with filling their own 
cabinets, will buy rare eggs or ferns, as the cjise may be., in any 
number, as a means of exchange only for other desiderata'. In 
one season alone upwards of seventy eggs of the beautiful little 
Bearded 'lit were taken at Surlingham, solely for this purpose, and 
though abundant there twenty yeai-s ago, it is now rarely seen. 
The Swallow-taded Butterfly {Pupilio machaon,) and amongst 
ferns the beautiful Ladnea cristata may be classed in the same 
category, the latter, to my knowledge, having been all but exter- 
minated in some localities, through the wholesale orders of London 
Florists, ihese and such like causes are beyond the control of 
Acts of Parliament ; but I look to an influence arising out of the 
proceedings of such societies as this, to create an interest in the 
preservation of all indigenous species ; and in the words of good 
old Thomas Bewick, with reference to the woodcuts of his “ British 
Birds^” I would adil in conclusion, “In viewing their portraits 
.SPAKE AND PROTECT THE ORUHNALS.’’ 
C 2 
