102 
NATURE NOTES 
Nature Notes continues to be very interesting, and the 
many complimentary notices in the Press must be very 
gratifying to Professor Boulger, the able Editor. 
Professor Boulger also brought the protection of plants before 
the British Association, and it was agreed to recommend the 
issue of a circular by the Association to teachers, and the pre- 
paration of a “ Reader ” for schools. 
I should, however, occupy too much of your time if I was to 
enumerate, however briefly, the work of the past year under our 
good Secretary, Mr. Webb. 
The influence of the Society is much needed. We hope 
and believe that we have effected something, but much still 
remains to be accomplished. The Journal of Botany justly 
deplores “ the wanton destruction of roadside beauty which 
now prevails throughout the entire country. The disfigurement 
of trees and hedges, the continual paring of roadsides and 
scraping of hedge bottoms, the parings and scrapings in almost 
every case being thrown on the hedge banks or what remains 
of the grassy borders of the roads.” Thus not only wasting 
the ratepayers’ money, but really disfiguring the country. 
The sale of feathers still flourishes. On August 4 no less 
than 238 packages were sold. Of Bird of Paradise skins, 
there were no less than 5,564, and others included the so- 
called Ospreys, Parrots, Orioles, Tanagers, Trogons and even 
Humming Birds. 
Ladies seem to prefer the authority of shopkeepers, who 
assert that the so-called “Ospreys” are artificial, to that of 
ornithologists, who know that they are real ; that they are only 
developed at nesting time, and that they involve the starvation 
of the young birds, so that they can only be obtained by an act 
of heartless cruelty. On this account they have been given 
up in the army. I have seen surprise expressed in the Press 
that young and pretty girls are more cruel than the War Office. 
This, however, is not, I think, correct. I have observed that 
it is not the young and pretty girls, as a rule, who wear them. 
The gamekeepers are, perhaps, even worse enemies of birds 
than ladies. In fact they only recognise Partridges, and 
Pheasants as worthy of the name. Owls and Hawks it is 
almost impossible to induce them to spare. Yet these are very 
useful. Mr. J. H. Gurney reports in the last number of the 
Zoologist that in the pellets in an Owl’s nest, which he had just 
examined, he found the remains of fourteen rats, thirteen shrews, 
and twenty-five mice ! 
But while we are anxious to save animals from all unneces- 
sary suffering and to preserve plants, we also believe that our 
principles add much to the charm, the happiness and the interest 
of life. 
The ancients looked upon the earth as something unique, 
the centre of the universe : we know that it is a small planet, 
revolving round a small star, one of many millions of heavenly 
