vol. xxvnn 



1911 



] Wright, Early Records of the Passenger Pigeon. 353 



killed thirty at one shot, I almost saw the shot, and saw the pigeons 

 after they were shot.'" This same year Coffin, when in the Red 

 River country, says that one day, 1 "While pitching our tents, a 

 flock of pigeons flew past, and down in the woods along the bank 

 of the river we could hear their cooing. Those who had shot-guns 

 went to the hunt." 



The last notice of the pigeon to be given is an extended account 

 by Geikie, who writes : ~ ' 'The flocks of pigeons that come in the 

 early spring are wonderful. They fly together in bodies of many 

 thousands, perching, as close as they can settle, on the trees when 

 they alight, or covering the ground over large spaces when feeding. 

 The first tidings of their approach is the signal for every available 

 gun to be brought into requisition, at once to procure a supply of 

 fresh food, and to protect the crops on the fields, which the pigeons 

 would utterly destroy if they were allowed. It is singular how little 

 sense, or perhaps fear, such usually timid birds have when collected 

 together in numbers. I have heard of one man who was out 

 shooting them, and had crept close to one flock, when their leaders 

 took a fancy to fly directly over him, almost close to the ground, 

 to his no small terror. Thousands brushed past him so close as 

 to make him alarmed for his eyes; and the stream still kept pour- 

 ing on after he had discharged his barrels, right and left, into it, 

 until nothing remained but to throw himself on his face till the 

 whole had flown over him. They do not, however, come to any 

 part of Canada with which I am acquainted in such amazing 

 numbers as are said by Wilson and Audubon to visit the western 

 United States. 



"A curious fact respecting them is that they have fixed roosting- 

 places, from which no disturbance appears able to drive them, 

 and to these they resort night by night, however far they may have 

 to fly to obtain food on the returning day .... 



"I myself have killed thirteen at a shot, fired at a venture into 

 a flock; and my sister Margaret killed two one day by simply 

 throwing up a stick she had in her hand as they swept past at a 

 point where we had told her to stand, in order to frighten them 



i Coffin, Charles Carleton. The Seat of Empire. Boston, 1870, p. 59. 

 2 Geikie, John C. Adventures in Canada; or Life in the Woods. Philadelphia, 

 pp. 212-216. 



