364 Wright, Early Records of the Passenger Pigeon. |_July 



There is one ivood bird, not often seen, but heard without any 

 melody in his note, in every part of the wilderness, wherever I 

 have been. In some parts of this extensive country the wild 

 pigeons breed in numbers almost infinite. I once passed an ex- 

 tensive valley where they had nested; and for six or eight miles, 

 where the trees were near and thick, every tree had a number of 

 nests upon it ; and some, not less than fifteen or twenty upon them : 

 But as soon as their young are able, they take wing and are seen 

 there no more." In 'A Journal of the New Hampshire Scout,' ' 

 Sir Wm. Johnson's trip from Lake George to Crown Point, 

 states that September 18, 1755, "Their People (French and In- 

 dians), some few [who] were at work at the Intrenchments seemed 

 unconcerned — hunting Pidgeons etc. all around in the Wood." 



In 1777 (June 23), when at camp at River Bouquet near Lake 

 Champlain, Anbury says: 2 "There are at this season of the year 

 prodigious flights of pigeons crossing the lake, of a most beautiful 

 plumage, and in astonishing quantities. These are most excellent 

 eating, and that you may form some idea as to their number, at 

 one of our encampments, the men for one day wholly subsisted 

 on them; fatigued with their flight in crossing the lake, they alight 

 upon the first branch they can reach to, many are so weary as to 

 drop in the water, and are easily caught; those that alight upon 

 a bough being unable to fly again, the soldiers knock down with 

 long poles. 



"During the flights of these pigeons, which cross this lake into 

 Canada, and are continually flying about in large flocks, the Cana- 

 dians find great amusement in shooting them, which they do after 

 a very singular manner: in the daytime they go into the woods, 

 and make ladders by the side of the tall pines, which the pigeons 

 roost on, and when it is dark, they creep softly under and fire up 

 this ladder, killing them in great abundance; they then strike a 

 light, and firing a knot of the pitch pine, pick up those they have 

 killed, and the wounded ones that are unable to fly. During the 

 flights of these pigeons, which generally last three weeks or a 

 month, the lower sort of Canadians mostly subsist on them." 



i Doc. Hist, of New York, Vol. IV, 1851. p. 259. (Svo edit.) 

 2 Anbury Thomas. Travels through the Interior Parts of America, in a Series 

 of Letters. 2 vols., London, Vol. I, 1789, pp. 275, 276. 



