70 
HINTS ON CAGE-BIRDS. 
to entrap and liold, even in a state of serai-freedom, the familiar 
songsters of our gardens, fields, and woods. 
The argument used, in defence of this illogical conclusion, is, 
that one can hear and watch British birds by taking a short trip 
into the country, whereas one must go abroad in order to study 
foreigners. Is this true ? Can we always hear the songs which 
give us pleasure by leaving the town behind us ? Can we at any 
season be sure of finding what we seek? Wo know such is far 
from being the case. 
As one cannot ensure hearing a Nightingale during a country 
ramble (I did not hear one for nearly twenty years of my life), so, in 
like manner, it is certain that, by visiting any of the large Zoological 
Gardens one may see, and to a certain extent study, many foreign 
species ; this argument, therefore, falls to pieces as soon as it is 
examined. 
I admit that I do not approve of capturing birds at all seasons ; 
it is abominable to trap or net them in the breeding season. Per- 
sonally, I would not capture our British songsters excepting in the 
severest winter weather ; then I consider it not only by no means 
cruel to entrap them, but, on the contrary, most merciful. It is 
some years now (as I writ® these notes) since we have had a really 
hard winter, but I well remember at that date, how everybody was 
shocked by the wholesale mortality amongst birds, which visitors to 
the country observed throughout the kingdom. 
That winter one only had to put out a trap with a little food in 
it, to have it surrounded by birds of various kinds, from a Book to 
a Tomtit. I caught many birds merely to save their lives, feeding 
them regularly until the severe frosts were over, and then turning 
them loose in plump condition, ready to pair up and perpetuate their 
kind. If, amongst these temporary lodgers, there were two or three 
which I elected to make permanent pets of, the latter at anyrate 
were provided oither with the partial liberty of a good-sized aviary 
or with a spacious cage. They were also safe from all fear of prowling 
foes, whilst good food and constant attention was assured to them 
for life. If they remembered, I am sure they seldom, if ever, regretted 
their former greater liberty. 
Among the many means contrived by man for catching birds 
the most unkind (in my opinion) is the use of limed twigs. Bird- 
lime is of two kinds : that made from holly -bark, witch is by far the 
more powerful, and which, in the hands of an experienced catcher, 
has, undoubtedly, proved veiy profitable ; that made by boiling down 
linseed oil into about the consistency of thick treacle, this being the 
stuff usually sold to the amateur, and rarely (if ever) resulting in 
anything beyond making him, and possibly a few venturesome 
sparrows in a sticky mess. In former days I regret to have to 
confess that I tried both, with no benefit to myself, and perhaps 
with some little discomfort to House-sparrows and Starlings. 
Birds caught with limed twigs are always moi’e or less dis- 
figured for weeks ; the feathers are stuck together and smeared 
