There is a great hue-and-cry over the scarcity of small
birds in England this winter. And no doubt some of them have fallen victims to the destructive agencies spread for them. The Rev. F. 0. Morris, writing in Thursday's Times, states, on the authority of the Bury Free Press, of December 13th, that no fewer than 2,040 dozen larks, 24,000 in all, had been cap. tured in three days at Lakenheath, in Suffolk. Such slaughter will certainly be punished by the comparative loss of one of the most delightful of all spring sounds, and unfortunately the punishment will be vicarious, for those who are punished will not be those who deserved punishment, and those who deserved it will not feel the penalty. For the rest, no doubt the birds have gone in search of the sun. Why should they stay, in a climate where the sun now is so seldom seen, having both the means of emigrating at their disposal, and no business here to detain them ? When the sun comes baelc—if it ever does-- perhaps they will come back, too.
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