THE TRADE IN BIRDS' SKINS. QEVERAL different forms of public
opinion have led the Indian Government to take a very important step for
the protection of bird-life in India. What is known as the East Indian trade in birds' skins for the purpose of ornament has been checked by the prohibition of the export of these skins for other than scientific purposes. This has been matter for great satisfaction to the Society for the Protection of Birds, and to a very large number of the public, whether in- terested in natural history or only concerned on humanitarian grounds. On the other hand, it is naturally resented by those engaged in the trade, one of the principal members of which, Mr. Harold Hamel Smith, in the Times of February 13th puts the case from the point of view of the business man and his employes ; while Sir Henry Seton-Karr combats the view of Mr. Harold Smith that partridge and pheasant shooting are as cruel as bird collecting, a view which scarcely needed controverting.
It will be noted that the feeling about the unnecessary, or wasteful, or cruel destruction of bird-life is something quite apart from the sentiment about sport. The latter is only dragged in as a half-logical but captious argument. But the former has extended from the legal regulation of the killing of English wild birds to a very far-reaching restriction in regard to a great dependency. The United States Govern- ment, controlling in a particularly drastic way, if it chooses, a very large population of free and equal voters, has done~ practically the same thing. But there is always a certain risk present when we over here cause or bring about legislation affecting tribes and populations which utterly fail to understand our notions or our motives. Lord Roberts has pointed out that one of the chief dangers to our rule in India is well-meant interference, and that the natives particularly resent restrictions on their. small outdoor earnings. The prohibition of entry for their cattle into the forests, and of fuel cutting there, has been intensely exasperating; and there is little doubt that in parts where shooting and snaring birds for the sake of their skins are really a side business of the peasants, they would look on this as an aggravation of the forest regulations, and regard the whole something in the same way as a Saxon peasant looked on the forest laws of the Normans, with their " schedule " of birds and beasts which were not to be taken, and their total prohibition of cutting hautbois, or of pasturing cattle in, or even driving them across, the forest.
Fortunately the Eat Indian bird-skin trade is a thing of recent growth, recent as things in the East go, that is. It is not part of the inherited tradition of the people. There is also evidence that it has not been carried on with any modera- tion. On the contrary, it has been accompanied by the same recklessness of feeling and lack of foresight which have marked the course of similar "businesses," such as those of the skin- hunters, who have destroyed big game in all quarters of the globe, and of the seal-hunters and whalers, who have partly, or ,quite, annihilated whole species even in the ocean. This has united against them three powerful classes,—the sportsmen, the humanitarians, and the naturalists. Probably the two birds on which the first and the last two respectively felt most strongly were the impeyan or " monaul " pheasants, and the paddy birds or egrets. The case of the latter is well known. They are especially killed in the breeding season for the sake of the nuptial plumes which grow then. Some very bad cases in Florida, where white traders caused the destruction of whole colonies of young by shooting the parents, aroused as much feeling in the United States as it did hem The egrets haunt the paddy or rice fields to feed, being swamp-loving birds. It is significant of the ignorance of the trade that Mr. Harold Smith sneaks of the birds generally as a " pests'ionresumably
thinking that they feed on the rice. They, feed on the molluscs and swamp creatures found in the wet fields, and would be as little likely to eat rice as is a heron to eat wheat. The case of the monauls is almost as bad. They are the splendid iridescent-green pheasants of the hills, the commonest, and quite the finest, of all the Indian pheasants, The splendour of their plumes is set off by a large square bright chestnut tail, and there is not a feather which does not make a fine ornament. When the trade sprang up the hillmen began to snare and kill them far more assiduously than before, because in addition to the value of the flesh that of the skin rewarded them. As no Indian native has the slightest feeling about a close time, the destruction of these and of other brightly plumaged birds soon caused a sensible decrease in their numbers, and has proceeded until the matter has engaged the attention of all Indian sportsmen. Even in the Further East, where other birds, such as the argus pheasant, the Javan and Burmese peacocks, and, further still, the birds of paradise, are being killed in increasing numbers, the matter has been taken up seriously. A special deputation on the subject waited on Lord Curzon during his visit to Burmah.
Probably more is known as to the effects of the trade on the number and survival of rare or persecuted species by those engaged in the ornithological department of the Natural History Museum than by any other body of men, scientific, sporting, or commercial. It is significant that the late Sir William Flower, whose soundness and sanity were beyond question, was very seriously concerned by the destruction taking place. Like the oracle at Delphi, be sat at the centre of information from all parts of the earth; and his protests were significant.
The present writer, in a very' careful inspection of the feathers in some of the best millinery establishments in London, was much impressed by the comparative absence of the skins or feathers of birds other than those eaten for food. In the best class of hats and bonnets only three kinds of feathers could be objected to. These were the "ospreys" (egrets), the grebes, and the plumes of birds of paradise. It is doubtful whether the latter, which live in a region of dense
forest, suffer unduly by the tithe paid to the milliner. The egret deserves, and will obtain, protection. But even the beautifully tufted " gown " feathers which lend such dis- tinction to a headdress are those of the great crowned pigeon which is eaten for food like other pigeons, and is an excellent bird for the table. Quantities of so-called eagles' plumes were from the pinions of vultures shot soon after they had their fresh feathers. The destruction of humming-birds, and very many other kinds of birds of brilliant plumage, is not done in the interest of high-class millinery at all, though unfortunately a great number of these, and of brilliantly plumaged small birds, as well as owls, are used as ornament for cheaper headgear made in Paris. Meantime nineteen-twentieths of the feathers in use, other than ostrich feathers, are those of game birds or poultry, dyed, curled, and arranged with wonderful art and exquisite taste. When it is considered that there are more than three hundred varieties of partridges and pheasants and other game birds alone, and that every one of them has plumage notable for splendour, harmony, or contrasts, it is not wonderful that, together with the turkeys, geese, wild ducks, pigeons, and swans, all of which supply the raw material of feathers, there is ample scope for a remunerative and beautiful craft in preparing these for ornament. The painting, curling, cutting, and arrangement of the vast variety of game-bird and poultry feathers are often so clever as to make it most difficult to determine what birds furnished them. The " make- up " of many is as ingenious as that of a salmon fly, while there are what may be called " stock " natural feathers, which are in constant requisition. Among these are the wings of the gadwall duck, a wild species shot for food in many places in great numbers, and the feathers of the tinamou, a South American partridge. But often it takes a " wise bird to know its own feathers " in these combinations.
In conclusion, it seems desirable that the opinion of experts, both in the museums at home, and among sportsmen and naturalists in the Empire abroad, should be consulted as to what species need protection, and as to the humanity of the time or means by which they are killed. The cruelty of natives is often quite revolting:. we could give plenty of instances
were it desirible. But where the birds are shot in a reason- able way, and not in the breeding time, then they should be regarded as a natural commodity, and made use of accord- ingly.
Previous page
