[ 4 ] 
that some species which become injurious when too 
numerous should be kept within bounds. Even our 
friends the Hooks, if allowed to increase until there 
are not enough wireworms and cockchafer grubs, etc., 
to go round, are apt to develop in times of scarcity 
into as mischievous marauders as the Carrion Crows. 
At times the ltooks have difficulty in finding their 
usual food, and then they have to live on what 
they can get—newly-sown corn, perchance, or even 
standing crops, or birds weaker than themselves; 
but it must always be borne in mind that the labourer 
is worthy of his hire, and that in the case of this 
particular labourer the proportion of insect food he 
consumes during the course of the whole vear will be 
as 75 per cent, of grubs to 15 per cent, or less of 
grain or other food-stuffs. Is it common sense to 
condemn him on the ground of that 15 per cent. ? 
I have no space in this short paper to go into 
technicalities. What I hope you will do is to use 
your eyes and brains, if you are not doing so already, 
to enable you to judge of the merits of every indict¬ 
ment made against a bird or other defenceless creature 
charged with a misdemeanour ; to watch the case for 
the defence, and never to favour unduly the prosecu¬ 
tion (I had almost written persecution), and to carry 
an open mind on the subject until you have mastered 
the whole of the facts, and have grasped the case for 
as well as against any wild thing that has, ab initio , 
an equal right with ourselves to live and move and 
have its being in our land. 
O * 
Copies of this Leaflet (No. 53), 3d. per doz., or is. 9d. per 100, may be 
obtained from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, 3, Hanover Square, 
London, W. 5000 - 7 ,’ 05 . 
Witherbt & Co., Printers, 326, High. Holfcorn, W.C. Telephone No. 92 Holborn. 
