INTRODUCTION.

our shores being often found after their occurrence literally strewn with Guillemots, Razorbills, and other
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a : ee er aonrded I ‘ ost’ [2 \ j
sea-birds ; in proof of which the following instances recorded in the ‘ Zoologist’ for 1872 may be cited.

« After the severe storm of January,” says Mr. H. Rogers (writing from the Isle of Wight), ‘‘ our shores

from Compton Bay to Watercombe Bay were lined with Razorbills, Guillemots, &c. I had upwards of a
hundred brought to me between the 25th and 3lst, most of them in a very bad condition, which had
evidently perished for want of food. Seven Gannets were also picked up and brought to me: this I consider
very remarkable. We do occasionally get a specimen in very hard winters ; but for seven of these powerful

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birds to be driven dead upon our shores shows the severity of the storm.

Mr. Stephen Clogg, writing from Looe two days later (February 20), says, “ The south-eastern shores of
Cornwall have been covered with the dead bodies of various birds during the present month. In a walk of
about a mile I numbered no less than sixty-nine dead bodies of Razorbills, in various stages of decay. This
state of things extends for upwards of ten miles; and when we consider the great numbers that have been
carried away for the purpose of making plumes for ladies’ hats, and others that did not come ashore, I think
we may safely conclude that thousands of the above-named species of birds have perished in this immediate
neighbourhood within a fortnight ; and if such has been the case in other parts of England, how vast must

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have been the mortality amongst them !’

To the above instances Mr. Newman, the indefatigable editor of the ‘ Zoologist,’ adds in a note, ‘ This
morning (February 21st) I met a man going over London Bridge with a clothes-basket full of Razorbills : he
could not, or would not, tell me how he came by them ; but, by the blood on the plumage, I think they had

come by a violent death.”

Lastly disease, the greatest of all misfortunes, plays its sad part among birds as well as among quadrupeds
and man. Grouse, as we all know, are frequently visited with great severity, and the sweeping hand of
death is not satisfied until all but a remnant have succumbed to its ravages. Nature, in her wisdom, may
cause all these various modes of destruction to take effect for some good end—to check, perhaps, an
inordinate increase of a particular species : quite certain it is that she never intended that five thousand Grouse
should be bred on a Lancashire moor, or that a thousand Blue Hares should inhabit the crown of a single

Scottish bill, as is often the case.

This unnatural over-crowdi ‘ I : : :
s unnatural over-crowding of the Grouse and Hares may have arisen in the case of the former from the
extreme Care ¢ attenti a : pits

are and attention bestowed upon them, and, as regards the latter, from the killing down of the
Golden Eagles and Foxes

Lagles oxes, of whose ve peer eee .

2 , of whose food the Blue Hare constitutes a large proportion ; and upon its undue

increase they were doubtless intended to afford a wholesome check

‘The jealous care,” says .
ce are says Mr. ay oy ie : Ps A x i : -
2 ys Mr. Robert Gray, in his ‘Birds of Western Scotland,’ ‘with which this