THE SMALL BIRD NUISANCE.

Temuka Leader, Issue 9411, 27 May 1882, Page 3

THE SMALL BIRD NUISANCE.

A new cure for the ills which farmers suffer by the small birds has been discovered. A gentleman noticing that it took but a short period of whisky drinking to subjugate man, tried its influence on his neighbors’ fowls through the medium of soaked wheat. Shortly after its reception by the deluded poulty they exhibited every phase of intoxication, and lay down, and died. The idea is, that if whisky-soaked grain will kill poultry, it should certainly cut off sparrows, green linnets, etc,, in the bloom of their youth, The English paper, from which the above has been clipped, says it is a discovery so important, that it should have a place beside the discoveries of Harvey Newton, and Addison. That is a most extraordinary notion. The effect of whisky on fowl has long been known. In the County of Cork, in Ireland, perhaps about 60 years ago, there was a poor farmer whose wheat was being destroyed by crows, which had their habitations in a rookery on the property of his landlord, an eccentric old gentleman. This old gentleman took a particular fancy for the crows, and when he noticed the farmer shooting them he ordered him to desist. “What am I to do with them your honor,” asked the farmer. “ Impound them, and I will pay for their trespass,” was the reply. Of course the landlord was joking, but his tenant determined to take him at his word. He at once soaked the wheat in whisky, scattered it broad cast over the ground, and before long had a large number of the crows as ‘ drunk as a lord.’ His landlord was as good as his word, and released the nn happy birds, paying handsomely the amount the farmer claimed for damages.

the late lord beaoonsFlji'LD AND THE QUEER. A writer in Truth says “ Some of the papers have been quite hysterical about the Queen’s long friendship for Lord Beaeonstiehl, and her keen appreciation of his talents. The real fact is that the Queen had scarcely ever seen Lord Beaconsficld when he became Prime Minister in 1868. He had managed to offend Her Majesty and Prince Albert in the days when he was leading the Protectionists ; and it is, I believe, a fact that until Mr Disraeli was Chancellor of the Exchequer, he was never once invited to a State entertainment, These functions were then more frequent and more brilliant than they are now, and, so far as I remember, a formal protest • against the exclusion was secretly sent to the Palace by. several of Mr Disraeli’s followers, it being pointed out that it was an unprecedented thing for the leader of the Opposition in the House of Commons to be thus neglected ; but Prince Albert was not fond of Mr Disraeli, and if he had lived it is quite certain that Lord Beaconsfield would never have become a Court favorite. It is rather an odd fact, by the way, considering the highflown eulogies of which the Prince Consort has ever been the subject, that the three statesmen whom he most disliked, and whom ho did his best to thwart and put aside, were Lord Palmerston, Mr Disraeli and Mr Gladstone. During the nine months Mr Disraeli was in office in 1868, he managed to ingratiate himself with the Queen, who, in the first instance, would scarcely hear of his becoming Prime Minister; and the good impression he then left was rendered permanent during the first months of his second tenure of power,