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abortive in their results? Take a case, for example, where a road divides 
two counties, and the eggs and young of a certain species are deemed 
worthy of protection in one county, yet not in the other. Is it not 
folly, under such conflicting regulations, to suppose that any real advan¬ 
tage can accrue to the species. Again, in the writer’s native county, 
where the eggs and young of the blackcap are considered sacred, but 
not those of its very closely-allied congener, the garden-warbler, can 
anyone believe that the former species is likely to reap extensive benefit 
from such inharmonious legislation ? When I say that the eggs of these 
two species so nearly approximate in shape, size, and colouring that the 
most expert of oologists would hesitate to distinguish them in a mixed 
series of both, the absurdity of the whole tiling is apparent. Anyone 
detected with blackcaps’ eggs in his possession would merely have to 
pass them off as garden-warblers’, and there would be an end of the 
matter. Yet, again, the willow-wren is protected in the county to which 
I have referred, but not the rarer and more local wood-wren. Thus the 
conviction is naturally forced upon me that the latter species is not 
known to those responsible for the framing of the “ list.” This is plain 
speaking, but either let us have commonsense legislation for our wild 
birds, or none at all. A patchwork affair is bound to be more or less 
unsatisfactory. I have noticed, too, that the grasshopper warbler goes 
locally unscheduled, though it possesses the most potential claims to 
protection! Then, again, with regard to the coal-tit, the marsh-tit, and 
the blue tit—all three species are addicted to pretty much the same 
kind of diet; but whereas the two former, by order of a certain County 
Council, have the oegis of protection encircling them in the breeding 
season, the little “bluecap” is left to shift for itself ! Why this impalpable 
and inconsequent discrimination? The young of the blue tit, 
according to Mr. Howard Saunders, are fed largely with the 
larvae of the gooseberry- and winter-moths, aphides, and other 
insects; while the old birds also prey on the grubs of the 
wood-boring beetles, the maggots from oak-galls, and spiders. Really, 
the mere contemplation of some of these County Council “ lists,” glowing 
with blunders the outcome of ignorance, is enough to tax the patience 
of those who possess only a superficial acquaintance with birds. To find, 
as I have done, sparrow-hawks, the most relentless of foes to game, 
protected, and turtle-doves ignored, shows the topsy-turvy state in which 
our much-advertised bird legislation is at present involved. 
