Britain and the United States for the 
protection of migratory birds in the 
United States and Canada. The 
draft of the proposed convention was 
submitted to the several provincial 
governments for their views, as the 
question was of provincial concern. 
The provincial governments unani¬ 
mously approved of the principle of 
the convention. As objections that 
were not considered to be insuperable 
were raised by only two of the 
provinces, and, as the Departments 
of Agriculture and of the Interior, 
and the Commission of Conserva¬ 
tion, strongly concurred in the opin¬ 
ion that the protection of these birds, 
as provided under the proposed 
convention, particularly on economic 
grounds, was most desirable, an 
Order-in-Council was passed on May 
31st, 1915, stating that the Cana¬ 
dian Government was favourably dis¬ 
posed to the conclusion of the pro¬ 
posed Treaty. With a view to 
securing the settlement of our objec¬ 
tions to certain provisions of the 
treaty further negotiations were 
undertaken in Washington early in 
the present year, as a result of which 
all the objections raised were com¬ 
pletely met with the exception of one 
that would have affected the vital 
principle of the proposed treaty, 
namely, the elimination of spring 
shooting. Accordingly, a revised 
draft convention embodying the 
changes, together with certain other 
improvements, was prepared and 
submitted to the Canadian Govern¬ 
ment in March, 1916. After further 
consideration of this revised draft by 
the Government an Order-in-Council 
was passed on the 29th June, 1916, 
stating that “Canada is prepared to 
agree to the conclusion of the con¬ 
vention” conditional to the adoption 
of certain other amendments which 
had been agreed to as a result of 
informal negotiation. 
The treaty was signed in Wash¬ 
ington on 16th August, 1916, by 
His Majesty’s Ambassador, Sir Cecil 
Spring-Rice, G.C.V.O., and the 
Secretary of State of the United 
States, Mr. Robert Lansing. On the 
unanimous vote of the Committee on 
Foreign Relations it was ratified by 
the Senate of the United States on 
29th August, 1916. 
Before giving the articles of the 
treaty it will be of interest to quote 
the words of the preamble: 
“Whereas many species of birds in the 
course of their annual migrations tra¬ 
verse certain parts of the Unites States 
and the Dominion of Canada; and, 
whereas, many of these species are of 
great value as a source of food or in 
destroying insects which are injurious to 
forests and forage plants in the public 
domain, as well as to agricultural crops, 
in both the United States and Canada, 
but are nevertheless in danger of ex¬ 
termination through lack of adequate 
protection during the nesting season or 
while on their way to and from their 
breeding grounds; 
“The United States of America and 
His Majesty the King of the U ited 
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland 
and of the British dominions beyond the 
seas, Emperor of India, being desirous of 
saving from indiscriminate slaughter and 
of insuring the preservation of such 
migratory birds as are either useful to 
man or are harmless, have resolved to 
adopt some uniform system of protec¬ 
tion which shall effectively accomplish 
such objects. . . .” 
The following are the articles of 
the treaty: 
ARTICLE I 
The High Contracting Powers declare 
that the migratory birds included in the 
terms of this convention shall be as 
follows:— 
1. Migratory Game Birds: 
(а) Anatidte or waterfowl, including 
brant, wild ducks, geese and swans. 
(б) Gruidse or cranes, including little 
brown, sandhill, and whooping cranes. 
(c) Rallidse or rails, including coots, 
gallinules and sora and other rails. 
(d) Limicolae or shorebirds, including 
avocets, curlew, dowitchers, godwits, knots, 
oyster catchers, phalaropes, plovers, sand¬ 
pipers, snipe, stilts, surf birds, turnstones, 
willet, woodcock, and yellowlegs. 
(e) Columbidse or pigeons, including 
doves and wild pigeons. 
2. Migratory Insectivorous Birds: Bobo¬ 
links, catbirds, chickadees, cuckoos, flickers, 
flycatchers, grosbeaks, humming birds, 
kinglets, martins, meadowlarks, night- 
hawks or bull bats, nut-hatches, orioles, 
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