London Birds Many of our naturalists, not least W. H.
Hudson, have wondered at the number of birds In London. In the very latest book of birds thanks are 'offered to H.M. Board of Works for special facilities given to listeners to birds' songs in Rich-. mond Park, where in the sequel the last gramophone records of a number of birds' songs were recorded. The Park is really a marvellous place. It is, among its minor advantages, a riding and steeplechase paradise ; it is even a sporting estate ; for, I believe, a certain number of pheasants are shot there; but above all it is a lovely and a spacious sanctuary, that attracts birds as different as are wild duck from the small migrant warblers. One of the chief difficulties of recording birds' song is that the microphone is supersensitive. It reproduces such unwanted noises as the distant barking of dogs or the hum of an aeroplane. It speaks marvels for Richmond's quietness—perhaps the last attribute that you would suspect, if you did'not know Richmond
that some of the records taken there are the most single, the least confused by unessential murmurs.
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