26o 



Bird - Lore 



inquire for what purpose these skins were used; and was told, though not in 

 these same words, that the only excuse or reason for this wholesale slaughter 

 of the beautiful and graceful creatures was to supply the women of the civi- 

 lized world with powder-puffs. I wonder how many women have realized 



RHEAS IN THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDEN AT BUENOS AIRES 

 Photographed by L. E. Miller 



this gruesome fact, when insisting on "genuine swan's down" when purchas- 

 ing the fluffy daubers! But the greatest surprise of all was still awaiting us. 

 I was called into the office and given the opportunity to listen to some 

 rather heated arguments against the laws that had recently been enacted in 

 my country, prohibiting the importation of wild birds' plumage. And by 

 degrees it dawned upon me that the concern had a large sum of money invested 

 in a stock of these goods, upon which it suddenly found it impossible to realize. 

 As proof, I was shown into a lower storeroom almost completely filled with 

 enormous burlap-covered bales that were stacked from floor to ceiling. These 

 were filled with Rhea feathers, and I was repeatedly assured that they had all 

 been taken from wild killed birds; and that practically the only market that 

 existed for these feathers was the United States of America, where they were 

 manufactured into dusters. No other country imported sufficient quantities 

 to render their collection profitable. As I vainly tried to estimate the quan- 

 tity that was housed within those four walls, I was relieved of all difficulty 

 by being told that there were exactly sixty thousand kilos — approximately 



