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THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



1882, some of the feather agents ' estabUshed 

 themselves at points on the New Jersey coast, 

 and sent out word to residents of the region 

 that they would buy the bodies of freshly 

 killed birds of all kinds procurable. The 

 various species of terns, which were then 

 abinidant on the Jersey coast, offered the best 

 opportunity for profit, for not only were they 

 found in vast numbers, but they were also 

 comparatively easy to shoot. Ten cents 

 apiece was the price paid, and so lucrative 

 a business did the shooting of these birds be- 

 come that many baymen gave up their usual 

 occupation of sailing pleasure parties and 

 became gunners. These men often received 

 as much as a hundred dollars a week for their 

 skill and prowess with the shotgun. 



It is not surprising that at the end of the 

 season a local observer reported: "One can- 

 not help noticing now the scarcity of terns 

 on the New Jersey coast, and it is all owing 

 to the merciless destruction." One might 

 go further and give sickening details of how 

 the birds were swept from the mud flats about 

 the mouth of the Mississippi, the innumer- 

 able shell lumps of the Chandeleurs, and the 

 Breton Island region. How the Great Lakes 

 were bereft of their feathered life, and the 

 swamps of the Kankakee were invaded. How 

 the white pelicans, western grebes, Caspian 

 terns, and California gulls of the West were 

 butchered, and their skinned bodies left in 

 pyramids to fester in the sun. One might 

 recount stories of bluebirds and robins shot 

 on the very lawns of peaceful, bird-loving 

 citizens of our Eastern States, in order that 

 the feathers might be spirited away to glut 

 the never-satisfied appetite of the wholesale 

 dealers. Never in this country have birds 

 been worn in such numbers as in those days. 

 Ten or fifteen small song birds' skins were 

 often seen sewed on a single hat. 



In 1886, Dr. Frank M. Chapman of the 

 American Museum, walked through the 

 shopping district of New York City on his 

 way home two afternoons in succession, and 

 carefully observed the feather decorations 

 on the hats of the women he chanced to meet. 

 He found, in common use as millinery trim- 

 ming, many highly esteemed birds, as the 

 following list which he wrote down at the 

 time will serve to show: Robin, brown thrush, 

 bluebird, Blackburnian warbler, blackpoU 

 warbler, Wilson's black-capp)ed flycatcher, 

 scarlet tanager, white-bellied swallow, Bo- 

 hemian waxwing, waxwing, great northern 



shrike, i)ine grosbeak, snow bunting, tree 

 sparrow, white-throated sparrow, bobolink, 

 meadow lark, Baltimore oriole, puri)le grackle, 

 bluejay, swallow-tailed flycatcher, kingbird, 

 kingfisher, pileated woodpecker, red-headed 

 woodpecker, golden-winged woodpecker, 

 Acadian owl, Carolina dove, pinnated 

 grouse, ruffed grouse, quail, helmet tjuail, 

 sanderling, big yellowlegs, green heron, 

 Virginia rail, laughing gull, common tern, 

 black tern and grebe. 



This was a period when people seemed to go 

 mad on the subject of wearing birds and 

 feathers. They were used for feminine 

 adornment in almost every conceivable 

 fashion. Here are two quotations from New 

 York daily papers of that time, only the 

 names of the ladies are changed: "Miss 

 Jones looked extremely well in white with a 

 whole nest of sparkling scintillating birds 

 in her hair which it would have puzzled an 

 ornithologist to classify." and again, "Mrs. 

 Robert Smith had her gown, of unrelieved 

 black, looped up witli black birds; and a 

 winged creature, so dusky that it could have 

 been intended for nothing but a crow, reposed 

 among the curls and braids of her hair." 



Ah, those were the halcyon days of the 

 feather trade! Now and then a voice cried 

 out at the slaughter, or hands were raised at 

 the sight of the horrible shambles, but there 

 were no laws to prevent the killing nor was 

 there any crystallized public sentiment to 

 demand a cessation of the unspeakable orgy, 

 while on the other hand more riches yet lay 

 in store for the hunter and the merchant. 

 There were no laws to protect these birds nor 

 was there, for a time, any forceful man in 

 evidence to start a crusade against the evil. 



The most shameless blot on the history of 

 America's treatment of her wild birds has to 

 do with the white egrets. From the backs of 

 these birds come the "aigrettes" so often 

 seen on the hats of the fashionable. Years 

 ago, as a boy in Florida, I first had an oppor- 

 tunity of ol)serving the methods emploj^ed 

 by the feather hunters in collecting these 

 aigrettes, which are the nuptial plumes of the 

 bird and are to be found on them only in the 

 spring. As a rare treat, I was permitted to 

 accept the invitation extended by a squirrel 

 hunter to accompany him to the nesting 

 haunts of a colony of these birds. Away we 

 went, in the gray dawn of a summer morning, 

 through the pine barrens of southern Florida, 

 until the heavy swamps of Horse Hanunock 



