1foature IWotes: 
Ube Selbocne Society’s flDagastite. 
No. 8. AUGUST 15, 1890. Vol. I. 
THE SEQUEL TO “A SEA-BIRDS’ ROCK AND ITS 
BRUTAL VISITORS.” 
UR readers will remember that articles with the above 
title appeared in the June and July numbers of Nature 
Notes dealing with the disgraceful conduct of certain 
officers of Her Majesty’s Army and Navy at the 
Island of Grassholm, and giving some account of the efforts 
made by the Selborne Society to bring the culprits to justice. 
Until quite recently this appeared to be hopeless ; the Admiralty, 
the War Office, and the representatives of the Government all 
returned evasive answers ; and all the resources of the circumlo- 
cution office seemed to have been called into requisition for the 
purpose of screening from their due punishment these aristo- 
cratic offenders against the law. 
We are now happy in being able to state that through the 
energy and persistence of Mr. John Colam, the well-known 
Secretary of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty 
to Animals, justice has been vindicated and the criminals not 
only exposed but punished. 
The trial took place on last Saturday at Haverford West. 
The offences were classified into four divisions, (1) for using a 
boat to take birds, (2) for using guns to take birds, (3) for taking 
wild birds, and (4) for shooting wild birds. 
The offenders were Colonel Henry Saurin, J .P., Captain H. D. 
Haig Haig, Captain Harvey, Lieutenants Dickson, Caulfield, Moles- 
worth and Shakcrsley ; and the name of the boat, commissioned in 
Her Majesty’s Navy and used by them was the “ Sir Richard 
Fletcher.” The worst offender appears to have been Colonel 
Saurin, who confessed to having used a thick stick to slaughter 
the birds with as they came from their nests, which he said he con- 
sidered better fun than shooting them. The evidence showed 
