42 
NATURE NOTES 
In a subsequent article the same paper continues — 
“ There will before long be an iinusOal chance of doing away with that cruel 
and contemptible parody of sport known as the King’s Buckhnunds, for when the 
Civil List is revised an item of ^15,000 for this purpose will be open to attack. 
We hope the ooporiunity will not be neglected .... We have a chance of 
removing an item from the Civil List .... and while saving money also 
removing an odious scandal.” 
ScAPA. — We have received a circular letter from Mr. Richard- 
son Evans, enclosing a statement of accounts as to the present 
position of the excellent society with the unfortunately long 
name of which he is honorary secretary. From this it appears 
that the efforts of the society in checking the abuses of public 
advertising have met with a considerable measure of success so 
far as the action of the London County Council is concerned ; 
but that the funds placed at the disposal of the society are 
wholly inadequate for the proper carrying on of its work. This 
complaint is, alas, one in which many other societies must 
sympathise. 
The South-Eastern Union of Scientific Societies. — The 
Annual Congress of this Union, to which the Selborne Society 
is affiliated, will take place at Haslemere, Surrey, on June 6, 7 
and 8, under the presidency of Mr. G. A. Boulenger, the 
eminent herpetologist of the British Museum. 
Penny-farthing Parrots. — We take the following from 
a recent issue of the Daily Mail : — 
“There was what the Society for the Protection of Birds might have called 
a great feast of ornithological death at the Commercial Sale Rooms in Mincing 
Lane yesterday', when ihou.sands and thousands of bird skins — skins with all the 
feathers attached to them — were disposed of under the hammer to the wholesale 
merchants. 
“Messrs. S. Figgis and Co. had 2,151 female birds of Paradise, and 480 
‘ various,’ while Messrs. Lewis and Peat had 847 more, and Messrs. Hale and Son 
531. The latter had also, among other items, I,l8l Impeyan pheasants, and 
osprey feathers, pariot skins, jay skins, crested pige(jns, owls, and other varieties 
were for disposal in large quantities .... The market in these commodities is 
at present rather high. Biids of Paradise went off in big batches, fifty or sixty to 
a lot sometimes, at from sixteen to twenty-four shillings a skin. Crested pigeons 
were cheaper; 225 of them were reserved at 3s. 6d. each, but these were .only 
heads and necks. Parrots were cheapest. A thousand of lately deceased pretty 
pollies went off like hot cakes at l^d. each.” 
The Spread of Humanitarianism. — Lady (to chimney- 
sweep) : “ Well, Mr. Smuts, are you going to make your little 
boy a sweep too ? ” 
Mr. Smuts : “ Well, no, ma’m. It’s such rough, dirty work, 
you see, ma’m, and he’s that fond of dumb animals that I think 
of making a butcher of him, or a horse-slaughterer.” — London 
Comic Paper. 
