Bums IN INDUSTRIAL DISTRICTS.
In the critique of " Exiled " in the Spectator of June 29th Mr. Jennings suggests surprise that an owl hoots from the solitudes of the sylvan mining district." He is probably not aware that to a very large extent wild bird life is being driven out of its natural haunts owing to the activities of game preservers. In a recent article in Everyman Mr. Douglas Gordon has commented on this new phenomenon, and he speaks of a district amongst the South Yorkshire coalfields where the river is used as a canal and receives the waste of collieries, blast furnaces, glass works and brick factories. In this unpromising neighbourhood jackdaws, magpies and crows can be found in deserted quarries, and moor-hen, coot, mallard, snipe, and widgeon inhabit the pools caused by the subsidence of the land due to underground workings and the reeds bor- dering the dingy river. The presence of an accidental owl among the other " exiles " of Mr. Galsworthy's play is there- ' fore not so remarkable as it seems.- -J. LEONARD CATHER, Upmeads, Bexhill Old Town, Sussex. •
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