Genre:

News-Commentary, Drollery

Subjects:

Ornithology, Cruelty, Crime

    Begins with an extract from the Gateshead Observer which reports that the president of the Tyneside Naturalists' Field Club, Rev. G C Abbs, calculated that 6,307,000,000 caterpillars would have been eaten by the 6,000 sparrows killed by members of the '"Sparrow-Club" in Essex'. Believes this supports the pejorative description of Essex inhabitants as 'calves'. Condemns the Essex bird murders as 'swinish' and points out that this abuse of 'the teaching of naturalists' is injurious to their own interests.