OIL ON TROUBLED WATERS.
The Kent and Sussex coasts are especially pilloried (by the Scottish S.P.C.A.) as areas of destruction for sea birds, including razor bills, puffms, guillemots and several species of gull. A letter on this subject was also published in The Spectator of April 14th. A very glum account of similar de- struction round the shores of Heligoland (now a bird sanctuary) appears in the current report of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. The enemy is oil. What evidence I have been able to collect indicates that this scum becomes worse, not better ; and there is a real danger that it may seriously affect the fish as well as kill the birds. The Kent and Sussex coasts are the worst from the accident of wind and current, but birds are being killed far out in the Atlantic by coats of oil. The evil can only be cured by international action.
W. BEACH THOMAS.
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