A Guardian of 
the Birds. 
( l6 5) 
THE BIRD WORLD. 
A Guardian of the Birds. 
One man in America, unsupported by 
any political party and backed by no 
great industry, but single-handed and 
without a cent in payment for his time, 
labour, or expenses, has, according to 
the World's Work, been “ mainly re¬ 
sponsible for the passage of identical 
laws in thirty-two States of the Union.” 
Mr. William Dutcher, a lover of living 
birds, is the man whose work is thus 
described: — At the head of the 
Audubon Society, a purely voluntary 
organisation for preserving bird-life, he 
has induced the various Legislatures to 
pass its model bird-protection law, 
simply out of love for birds and from 
appreciation of their value. The law 
provides in general for the protection of 
all except game birds, and allows only 
a short hunting-season. Besides the in¬ 
difference of most legislators, Mr. 
Dutcher has had the active opposition 
of many to overcome. For example, he 
appeared before the proper committee 
in the Georgia Legislature to urge that 
the Society’s game laws be passed. One 
Senator settled himself in his chair and, 
with the air of a man who held all the 
trumps, asked Mr. Dutcher: ‘ Well, 
what makes you do all this?” Mr. 
Dutcher explained that he was interested 
in bird protection and was an officer of 
a society devoted to that object. 
“ Well, I* guess you do it to keep busy 
and to interfere,” replied the Senator, 
11 and I’m against your Bill. He re¬ 
sented outside interference with 
Georgia’s affairs, and his opposition 
killed the Bill that Session. “That’s 
where I made a bad mistake,” said Mr. 
Dutcher. “If I had asked him to in¬ 
troduce the Bill, everything would have 
gone beautifully. But Georgia passed 
the Act later. The fact that thirty-two 
States have passed the Audubon 
Society’s model law not only shows a 
great quantity of work, but infinite tact 
and judgment as well. At the sugges¬ 
tion of the Society, President Roosevelt 
has set aside as preserves and breeding- 
grounds for birds two groups of islands 
in the Great Lakes, Passage Key off 
Florida, and the Breton Isles on the 
Louisiana coast. But it is quite as hard 
to have the laws enforced as it is to have 
them enacted. Virginia passed the 
model law in 1903, and it immediately 
became a dead-letter, because no pro¬ 
vision was made for its enforcement. 
Last year Mr. Dutcher went to Rich¬ 
mond to induce the Legislature to 
remedy this defect. His plan was to 
tax every gun in the State is. a year, 
and hire game-wardens with the pro¬ 
ceeds. The Bill came up in a com¬ 
mittee. The chairman, a six-foot-and-a- 
half member from the mountains, was 
on his feet in a second. “A tax on 
guns! ” he said, almost incredulously. 
“Well, if I let such a Bill as that be 
reported in the House, this will be the 
last time I’ll ever be elected.” The Bill 
was killed, and the only game-wardens 
in Virginia are those employed on the 
Eastern Coast by the Audubon Society 
itself- 
Nest 1 ancLEggs^of the Blackcap. 
