66 THE PASSENGER PIGEON IN PENNSYLVANIA 



beasts ; for food, at times they Were compelled to mix 

 the bark of trees with their corn meal, so it would 

 hold out longer, and at times they dug up the potatoes 

 they had planted — so near they were to starvation — 

 and then the pigeons came! Food at once was most 

 plentiful. Their strength was renewed, as by a mir- 

 acle ; hope revived in their hearts ; their courage blazed 

 high; they walked a hundred miles, joyously, to the 

 nearest grist mill to have their handful of corn ground, 

 and hustled home again, so their wives and their chil- 

 dren might have bread to eat with their rations of meat 

 and fish. 



Many of them did their own grinding by means of 

 the hollowed out stump of a hardwood tree and a pes- 

 tle of stone, or of seasoned wood. But they perse- 

 vered, and soon, thriving villages dotted the forests ; the 

 hum of their industry and the shouts of woodsmen and 

 raftsmen told of the business their energy was creating 

 in the forests — a business that placed Pennsylvania, for 

 a while, at the head of the great lumber producing 

 states of the world. Then declining forest areas 

 forced back our record step by step, to second ; to third ; 

 then to fourth place in production of lumber. The 

 white pine went first; then the hemlock; and later, the 

 various hardwoods have become of moderate import- 

 ance. Now we import much of the forest material we 

 need from year to year. Indians have become citizens ; 

 turned farmers, and are as tame as their poultry. 



