go 
NATURE NOTES. 
to bear to keep the measure to the mark Mr. Pease then set 
before himself, viz., to extend the close-time to the ist of 
September, and so to overrule and overcome any malign 
influences which will, I have no doubt, be exerted in the 
opposite direction. 
Let us be told for what possible good object could, or can, 
any such be exerted ? “ That’s what I want to know” as John 
Bright used to say. 
In Nature Notes for March, 1891, you yourself wrote, and 
wrote well, “ What is really wanted is a healthy public opinion 
to frown upon all who ruthlessly destroy one of the greatest 
ornaments of the sea side, whether it is done in pure wantonness, 
or to minister to the meretricious taste of a thoughtless milliner.”* 
The Times, too, wrote on March 21st of the present year, of 
the “horrible and heart-rending scenes” that could be wit- 
nessed, “ at any time on a summer day ” before the passing of 
the “ Sea Birds Protection Act,” and you also spoke, in the 
number of the same date, of the “ slaughter of sea birds at 
Flamborough and Speeton on the gth of August.” 
Now the “horrible and heartrending scenes” spoken of, are 
just the same, in themselves, and just the same in the latter 
half of the month as in the former. The month of August means 
the whole of it, and not either one half or the other. 
I will, however, say no more as to this, but will only lay the 
present state of the case before your readers, and urge upon 
them, one and all, to do everything in their power in the direc- 
tion above spoken of, which is, in brief, to get all the voting 
power they can influence in the House of Commons to stand 
out for the ist of September being fixed as the date for the 
close-time to extend to for these unfortunate birds — though 
there can be no earthly reason why they should not be protected 
for the whole of the year. 
Mr. Pease wrote as follows to me, on the ist of last 
February: — 
“ I propose to draw the Sea Birds’ Close-Time, 1891, Bill, 
very briefly, making it practically one clause, interpreting the 
Wild Birds Protection Act, 1880, as regards sea birds, and 
simply altering the word August to the word September, so 
that the principal Act shall be read, as far as sea birds are 
concerned, throughout as if the word “ September ” was sub- 
stituted for “August.” I shall have to define sea birds, and 
propose to do it on these lines : — The words, ‘ sea birds,’ shall 
for all the purposes of this Act be deemed to mean all sea 
birds, including ” — (here recite the names of different kinds) ; 
but shall not include such birds as — (here recite certain other 
kinds).” F. O. Morris. 
* Mr. Morris inadvertently attributes to us a sentence with which we entirely 
concur, but which is from the pen of the well known naturalist Mr. J. Jenner 
Weir, F.L.S. 
