INTRODUCTION. 
XI 
prove fatal to many thousands of the feathered creation : in support of tills assertion I annex some extracts 
from various sources. Under the heading “ Severity of the Weather ” we read in ‘Land and Water ’for 
January 26, 1867. 
“We receive from various parts of the country accounts of the effects of the recent cold upon all kinds of 
game. A correspondent of the ‘Inverness Courier’ says that in Strathnairn, in common with other parts of 
the country, not a sprig of heather is visible anywhere ; and there can he no doubt that if the snow and frost 
continue any length of time the destruction among all kinds of game will be beyond all precedent. Already 
Muirfowl are flocking in thousands to the low-lying grounds ; and on Saturday last we noticed the 
birch-wood around Craggie literally swarming with them. A farmer in Strathnairn told us that one day 
lately, as he entered his stable, the entire area of his courtyard was covered as ‘ thick as they could stand ’ 
with grouse picking up any thing they could get among the dung-heaps; and similar ‘gatherings’ could be 
told by many other farmers.” 
Again, in the same journal, for August 3, 1867, Mr. Henry Lee, writing of the “ destruction of small 
birds by rain,” says: — 
“ My friend Dr. Millar, of Bethnal House, Bethnal Green, writes me as follows : — ‘ Good evidence of the 
severity of the rain during Thursday night (July 25th) has been afforded here in the destruction of nearly 
all the sparrows which congregate in our trees. My under-gardener picked up one hundred and twenty-four 
on the following morning; and in sweeping up the fallen leaves of to-day the dead birds are being found in 
considerable numbers. We estimate that more than two hundred were killed.’ ” 
\ 
Mr. E. H. Rodd, writing to me from Penzance under the date of January 8, 1867, says, “ I foresaw that 
there was hard weather somewhere, although the thermometer never showed a greater amount of frost than 
one degree, which was the lowest reading here ; 60 miles to the eastward the reading was on Wednesday 
nine degrees above zero, and on Thursday only five : so much for our climate. The heavy weather to the 
eastward has driven millions of Linnets, Starlings, Larks, Redwings, Fieldflires, Peewits, and Golden Plovers 
to this district.” As I was at the time on a visit to Lord Falmouth at Tregothnan, most of the facts 
mentioned by Mr. Rodd came under my own observation ; and I may add that the destruction of these birds 
was immense ; I myself saw lying dead on the frozen snow hundreds of Starlings, Song-Thrushes, Missel- 
Thrushes, Redwings and Fieldfares, but none of the Common Blackbird, and noticed that several of the 
weakly birds were attacked and eaten by the Rooks, which, themselves in an exhausted state, flocked round 
the house, and at times even approached the drawing-room windows. 
Violent and heavy gales also frequently lend their aid towards the destruction of bird-life, as evidenced by 
