202 Cincinnati Society of Natural History, 



hundreds of individuals. Now, a relative recently from there, tells 

 me the prairie hens are nearly all gone from that locality. 



The statement that our most desirable and familiar song-birds 

 are not in demand on account of their plain colors is a distortion 

 of the facts in the -case. I was once offered an order at good 

 prices either in cash or in exchange for South American birds^ for 

 as many scarlet tanagers, Baltimore orioles, yellow-breasted chats, 

 indigo birds, bluebirds, cardinal grosbeaks, wood-thrushes, robins, 

 brown thrashers and meadow-larks, all of which are our most valu- 

 able and familiar songsters, and nearly all the brightest colored of 

 our birds. In fact, the letter staled that almost anything could be 

 used in almost unhmited quantities. It is a mistake to suppose 

 that brilliant color is the only desideratum in birds for hat decora- 

 tion, for the plumage of the peafowl (one of the most brilliantly 

 colored birds in the world) is not used as much as some of our 

 more plain coated songsters. 



In regard to the omniijresent small bad boy we must agree 

 with Dr. Langdon, that he might be in worse mischief than robbing 

 bird's nests and stoning birds (a study of ornithology undoubtedly 

 has an elevating and refining influence, and was never complained 

 of by your committee), and we would not entirely suppress him 

 (in an ornithological sense) either for ftar of depriving the country 

 of some Baird, Audubon, Allen or Ridgway. Yet it might be 

 difficult to convince our surburban residents, who love and pro- 

 tect birds, that the plundering young urchin's gratification in de- 

 veloping his taste for ornithology with rocks and pea-shooters is in 

 any way conductive to science. 



Mr. H. Wilson Brown, who told me recently how some robins 

 had attempted for two years in succession to rear broods in the 

 shade trees in front of his house, but each time the boys had de- 

 stroyed the nests, and that one disciple of the pea-shooter was seen 

 in the neighborhood with thirty-five fresh birds eggs in his pos- 

 session, as the result of one morning's foray; or the Rev. Mr. 

 Rishell, who brought me a mangled wood thrush, shot from her 

 brood near his door by one of the above mentioned discij^les, who 

 was thirsting after ornithological knowledge — these gentlemen, I 

 fear, would consider this more partaking of cussedness than 

 science. 



There are about twenty-five persons, mostly boys, who collect 

 birds' eggs in this vicinity, and who systematically hunt for nests 

 and eggs, and in most cases the sole object seems to be to get more 



