Society for the Protection of Birds.— No. 12. 
ISIRD-e/cTCJHIN©. 
f T has long been thought desirable by all who wish not to see rural 
England deprived of its best songsters, that some restriction should 
be put on the trade of Birdcatching. As things are now the bird- 
catchers, without trespassing, or in any way infringing the bird protecting 
laws we possess, are well able to drain any locality where they choose to 
establish themselves of its most valued species, 
Richard Jefferies, whose books on country subjects are familiar to most 
readers, may be instanced as one of those who expressed the greatest 
indignation at the licence permitted to the birdcatcher, which enables 
him to strip the hedges, fields, and copses of their feathered inhabitants. 
Jefferies, it should be borne in mind, looked with unfriendly eyes on any 
attempt to deprive the countryman of his prescriptive right to take and 
destroy wild birds and their eggs; the birdcatchers, even he regarded as an 
unmitigated evil, and his wish was to see them swept out of the lanes and 
commons. Every lover of nature who lives in the country must share 
in this feeling^ 
Vand it is simply 
monstrous that dwellers in London and other towns, to gratify a taste 
for caged songsters, should have it in their power to send out and take 
birds by the million every year, most of which are doomed to perish after 
a few days of miserable captivity. 
How, then, does it happen, it may be asked, that this matter has never 
been considered by our legislators? To this question an answer has been 
furnished by one who has assisted in framing most of the Bills for the 
better protection of our wild birds, which have been introduced into 
Parliament during the last two decades: this is, that when these Bills were 
successively brought forward it did not appear that the time had come 
to deal with the birdcatching question; that other matters were more 
pressing, and it was considered best not to ask for too much, especially as 
it was not known how laws of this kind would work. To these reasons 
for delay it might be added that the effect of birdcatching on the bird life 
of the country was not too well known ; at all events, the facts had not 
been collected and made public. And this still remains to be done. A 
study of the subject will probably show that while the amount of bird life 
has not greatly diminished from this cause, its character has altered owing 
to the large and constant demand for certain favorite species, while for other 
species, like the common sparrow, there is absolutely no demand. A case 
in point is that of the goldfinch. The statement is frequently met with in 
print that this bird has decreased, and is even disappearing from the country, 
on account of the destruction of the thistle, on the seeds of which it 
feeds, If this were so, the evil would be without a remedy ; for cultiva¬ 
tion must spread as population increases, and it would only remain for us 
to lament the loss of one of our most charming species, a lively singer 
and one of the very few birds in England which possess a brilliant 
colouring. But it is not credible. The goldfinch is fond of the thistle 
seed, and where thistles abound the birds will flock after the breeding 
season, and so long as the seed is ripening they will seek it in preference to 
other food. But they can, and for the greater part of the year do, Jive 
