IRature IFlotes: 
tibe Selbome Society’s fibagasine 
No. 33. SEPTEMBER, 1892. Vol. III. 
A PLEASANCE WITH BIRDS. 
HE lover of birds often feels a twinge of conscience when 
he confines in cages other species than such domestic 
ones as the canary and ring-dove. Most wild birds 
so caged appear too often to make restless efforts to 
escape, but in roomy aviaries or volaries it is rare to see a 
bird make any effort to liberate itself, and when they can be 
allowed full liberty to roam at will with the complete use of their 
wings, the ornithophilist feels that by taking the bird under his 
protecting care, and furnishing it with regular supplies of food, 
he is positively benefiting it, by screening it from danger and 
saving it from hunger. There are but nine domestic birds 
usually kept in this country which can have perfect liberty, and 
yet as a rule do not desert the homestead ; even our two cage- 
birds, which are habitually reared in confinement, viz., the 
canary and ring-dove, cannot be given their full liberty without 
the greatest risk of their straying. 
It was therefore with no small pleasure that, through the 
courtesy of Mr. W. Ingram, M.P., whose residence at Westgate 
I have lately visited several times, I was enabled to see this 
difficult matter satisfactorily dealt with. That gentleman in 
his grounds has birds living most happily in every variety of 
condition ; in confinement in very large cages, in spacious 
volaries, in the walled-in pleasance, and lastly, with perfect 
liberty and undipped wings. 
This note is not written for the ornithologist but for the Sel- 
bornian ; it will not, therefore, be necessary to describe the 
numerous choice species which form the collection ; but there is 
one class of birds in which Mr. Ingram is particularly rich — he 
has ten albinos, viz., three white jackdaws, three white black- 
birds, a white thrush, a white starling, a white hedge sparrow, 
and what I believe to be a pure wffiite variety of the herring gull. 
