1911 Craig, Emotion in the Passenger Pigeon. 409 



work in collecting scattered records of the species. But accounts 

 of its voice and gestures are especially scarce. Wilson, for example, 

 makes only this brief statement on the subject: "They have the 

 same cooing notes common to domestic pigeons, but much less 

 of their gesticulations." Even this last brief clause, however, 

 is of value to countervail Audubon's florid description. Audubon 

 has more to say than any other writer on the voice and gestures of 

 the species, but his account is so full of errors that at the end of this 

 paper (p. 423) I shall criticise it in detail. A criticism of the figures 

 on Audubon's plate will follow the discussion of his text, and a 

 criticism of other published figures will be found on pp. 411, 412. 



The present study of the expressions of the Passenger Pigeon is 

 also inadequate and, I fear, also incorrect in some details; all 

 that can be said is, that I have made it as truthful and as adequate 

 as I can. I saw this bird in a wild state only once to my knowledge, 

 in Chicago in 1891, l as recorded by my late lamented friend Dr. 

 Dunn (Dunn, 1895). My studies of the voice of the species were 

 all made in Professor Whitman's aviary, chiefly in the year 1903, 

 a year which was too late to see much of the vanishing birds, yet 

 too early in my own study for me to have a good grasp of the 

 problems. For Professor Whitman's aviary contained that sum- 

 mer no Passenger Pigeons in full breeding operation, but only a 

 few unmated birds, one male mated with a female of his own 

 species, one mated with a female Mourning Dove, and one mated 

 with a female Ring-Dove, none of these mated birds carrying their 

 breeding operations to completion. And as for a grasp of the 

 problems, suffice it to say that science has not yet reached the 

 point where it can well understand and record the language of 

 any bird. My notes were not published when first taken, because 

 they were felt to be so inadequate ; now, after several years further 

 study of doves, I can better understand the facts concerning the 

 Passenger Pigeon, but I have forgotten many details. Hence, 

 the following notes are put forth, not with the assurance that they 

 adequately represent the repertory of this remarkable species, 

 but only with regret that the meagre information now to be given 

 is all we are likely to have on the subject. 



1 This occurrence of the species has been overlooked by Mershon in his list of 

 occurrences. 



