436 



THE PASSENGER PIGEON. 



Fruit Pigeon is in great request for the table, and is shot by hundreds. During the nutmeg 

 season, these Pigeons find such an abundance of food that they become inordinately fat, and 

 are sometimes so extremely plump, that when they are shot, and fall to the ground, they 

 burst asunder. 



Setting aside the gastronomical properties of this bird, it is a most useful creature, being 

 the means of disseminating far and wide the remarkable nutmeg-tree. The Pigeon being a 

 bird of large appetite, swallows the nutmeg together with the mace, but only the latter sub- 

 stance is subject to digestion, the nutmeg itself passing through the system with its repro- 

 ductive powers not only uninjured, but even improved. The sojourn within the body of the 



bird seems to be almost necessary in 

 order to induce the nutmeg to grow ; 

 and when planted by human hands, 

 it must be chemically treated with 

 some preparation before it will strike 

 root. 



The color of this species is as 

 follows: The forehead, cheeks, and 

 throat are grayish-white, and the 

 rest of the head and the back of the 

 neck are gray with a slaty blue wash. 

 The back and upper portions of the 

 body are light metallic green. The 

 lower part of the throat and the 

 breast are rusty gray, and the thighs 

 and abdomen are deep brownish-red. 

 The under surface of the tail is also 

 green, but with a reddish gloss. The 

 total length of the bird is about 

 fourteen or fifteen inches. 



AMONG the most extraordinary 

 of birds, the PASSENGER PIGEON may 

 take very high rank, not on account 

 of its size or beauty, but on account 

 of the extraordinary multitudes in 

 which it sometimes migrates from 

 one place to another. The scenes 

 which take place during these migra- 

 tions are so strange, so wonderful, 

 the Atlantic, that they could not 



PASSENGER PIGEON. Ectoptetes migratoriut. 



and 



so entirely unlike any events on this side of 

 be believed, but for the trustworthy testimony by which they are corroborated. To 

 abridge or to condense the spirited narrations of Wilson and Audubon would be impossible, 

 without losing, at the same time, the word-painting which makes their descriptions so 

 exceedingly valuable ; and, accordingly, these well-known naturalists shall speak for them- 

 selves. 



After professing his belief that the chief object of the migration is the search after food, 

 and that the birds having devoured all the nutriment in one part of the country take wing in 

 order to feed on the beech-mast of another region, Wilson proceeds to describe a breeding- 

 place seen by himself in Kentucky, which was several miles in breadth, was said to be nearly 

 forty miles in length, and in which every tree was absolutely loaded with nests. All the 

 smaller branches were destroyed by the birds, many of the large limbs were broken off and 

 thrown on the ground, while no few of the grand forest-trees themselves were killed as surely 

 as if the axe had been employed for their destruction. The Pigeons had arrived about the 

 tenth of April, and left it by the end of May. 



