34 
BY THE WAYSIDE 
THE U. S. A. TARRIFF BILL* 
Numerous letters received during 
the last three months of 1913 from for¬ 
eign correspondents, and from articles 
which have appeared in Continental 
newspapers, are strong evidence of the 
feeling which is quickly growing in 
civilized lands with regard to the 
traffic in birds’ skins and feathers. 
Germany. 
Professor C. G. Schillings, the dis¬ 
tinguished naturalist, author of “With 
Flashlight and Rifle' 7 and “In Dark¬ 
est Africa. 77 says: 
“The United States has found the 
only satisfactory solution of this ques¬ 
tion. Only direct prohibition will 
reach the core of the matter; all other 
measures would be am ineffective com¬ 
promise. . . . "We German friends 
of nature and of the birds, convinced 
too of the great economic importance 
of the latter, only wait anxiously that 
England, too, may get its Feather Im¬ 
portation law. We certainly will fol¬ 
low. If Australia, North America, 
England, and Germany close the mar¬ 
ket, the trade will die out. The move¬ 
ment is quite a young one in Germany. 
England has had it for years and 
years; so you understand we cannot 
lead. You cannot expect this. Please 
publish that Germany follows. Eng¬ 
land! Then comes Germany! My 
new little book dealing strongly with 
the question is coming out in a few 
weeks. 7 ’ 
Professor Schillings is not without 
high authority in thus speaking. 
From the German Bund fill* Vogel- 
scliutz, Baroness Rotberg writes:— 
“We are much in favour of your 
Bill; it is more than probable that if it 
pass we shall secure prohibition in 
Germany. We are not going to make 
any concession to the trade, thinking 
it better to have no law at all than an 
insufficient one allowing the sale of 
many kinds of plumage to proceed as 
before. . . . Prohibition in Eng¬ 
land will most assuredly not spread 
the trade to the Continent. The fash¬ 
ion is sure to change, because France 
simply cannot do without the Ameri¬ 
can and English markets. 77 
At the annual meeting of the Society 
for Medical and Scientific Research 
(Versammlung Deutscher Aerzte und 
Naturforscher), the most important 
scientific society of Germany, a resolu¬ 
tion was passed asking the government 
to bring in a bill prohibiting the im¬ 
portation of feathers of wild birds. 
More significant still, perhaps, is the 
voice of the German trade papers. The 
Kolnische Zeitung (Nov. 5) says: 
“We surmise that the fashion for 
aigrettes has reached its end. Paris 
cannot hold its own unaided by the 
American and English markets. A 
change in the fashion is therefore im¬ 
minent. France has already a new hat 
ready for the window, trimmed with 
flowers or ostrich feathers only. The 
wholesale hat and feather trade in 
Germany is doing its level best to con¬ 
tinue the fashion for the Egret and is 
paying large sums for these plumes. 
But if Paris decrees their abolition, the 
feathers are bound to go down in 
value, and a catastrophe is inevitable. 
German Fashion (Oct. 26) says: 
“Thanks to tin* prohibition of import 
into America and the coming Plumage 
