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INTRODUCTION. 
our shores being often found after their occurrence literally strewn with Guillemots, Razorbills, and other 
sea-birds ; in proof of which the following instances recorded in the ‘ Zoologist ’ for 1872 may be cited. 
“ After the severe storm of January,” says Mr. H. Rogers (writing from the Isle of Wight), “ our shores 
from Compton Bay to Watercombe Bay were lined with Razorbills, Guillemots, See. I had upwards of a 
hundred brought to me between the 25th and 31st, most of them in a very bad condition, which had 
evidently perished for want of food. Seven Gannets were also j)icked up and brought to me ; this I consider 
very remarkable. We do occasionally get a specimen in very hard winters ; but for seven of these powerful 
birds to be driven dead upon our shores shows the severity of the storm.” 
Mr. Stephen Clogg, writing from Looe two days later (February 20), says, "The south-eastern shores of 
Cornwall have been covered with the dead bodies of various birds during the present month. In a walk of 
about a mile I numbered no less than sixty-nine dead bodies of Razorbills, in various stages of decay. This 
state of things extends for upwards of ten miles ; and when we consider the great numbers that have been 
carried away for the purpose of making plumes for ladies’ hats, and others that did not come ashore, I think 
we may safely conclude that thousands of the above-named species of birds have perished in this immediate 
neighbourhood within a fortnight ; and if such has been the case in other parts of England, how vast must 
have been the mortality amongst them !” 
To the above instances Mr. Newman, the Indefatigable editor of the ‘ Zoologist,’ adds in a note, “ This 
morning (February 21st) I met a man going over London Bridge with a clothes-basket full of Razorbills : he 
could not, or would not, tell me how he came by them ; but, by the blood on the j)lumage, I think they had 
come by a violent death.” 
Lastly disease, the greatest of all misfortunes, plays its sad part among birds as well us among quadrupeds 
and man. Grouse, as we all know, are frequently visited with great severity, and the sweeping hand of 
death is not satisfied until all but a remnant have succumbed to its ravages. Nature, in her wisdom, may 
cause all these various modes of destruction to take eflfect for some good end — to check, perhaps, an 
inordinate increase of a particular species : quite certain it is that she never intended that five thousand Grouse 
should be bred on a Lancashire moor, or that a thousand Blue Hares should inhabit the crown of a single 
Scottish hill, as is often the case. 
This unnatural over-crowding of the Grouse and Hares may have arisen in the case of the former from the 
extreme care and attention bestowed upon them, and, as regards the latter, from the killing down of the 
Golden Eagles and Foxes, of whose food the Blue Hare constitutes a large proportion ; and upon its undue 
increase they were doubtless intended to afford a wholesome check. 
says Mr. Robert Gray, in his ‘ Birds of Western Scotland,’ “ vvith which this 
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"The jealous care,” 
