Goldfinches ran to eighteenpence, sometimes as much as two shillings. Starlings he had made a lot out of, but that was all past and over. Why? Because they were not wanted--because people were such fools that they now preferred to shoot at pigeons. He hated pigeons! Gentlemen used to shoot starlings at matches; and if you had the making of a bird to shoot at, you couldn't get a better than the starling--such a neat bird! He had caught hundreds--thousands--and had sold them well. But now nothing but pigeons would they have. Pigeons! Always pigeons! He caught starlings still, but what was the good of that? The dealers would only take a few, and they were worth nothing--no more than greenfinches and yellow-hammers. My colloquy with my enemy on the common tempts me to a fresh digression in this place--to have my say on a question about which much has already been said during the last three or four decades, especially during the 'sixties, when the first practical efforts to save our wild-bird life from destruction were made. There is a feeling in the great mass of people that the pursuit of any wild animal, whether fit for food or not, for pleasure or gain, is a form of sport, and that sport ought not to be interfered with. So strong and well-nigh universal is this feeling, which is like a superstition, that the pursuit is not interfered with, however unsportsmanlike it may be, and when illegal, and when practised by only a very few persons in any district, where to others it may be secretly distasteful or even prejudicial. Even bird-catching on a common is regarded as a form of sport and the bird-catcher as a sportsman--and a brother.