ORNAMENTAL PLUMES 167 



bred in tens of thousands, crowded as close as 

 they comfortably could, and there they still were 

 when the feather seeking expedition arrived from 

 Honolulu in the spring of 1909. For several 

 months the slaughter continued until a stop was 

 put to it by the United States revenue-cutter The- 

 tis. But the cutter arrived almost too late ; more 

 than half the birds on the island had been killed. 

 Three hundred thousand albatrosses, gulls, terns, 

 and other birds had already been butchered. Lay- 

 san Island was indeed a desert of bones. 



And the ruthless methods of slaughter are not 

 confined to sea-birds. It is the custom to shoot 

 the graceful egrets as they approach their nests. 

 As the birds skitter helplessly to earth they are 

 seized by the hunters, who tear the patches of 

 skin holding the lacy plumes from their backs 

 before the birds have expired. The youngsters 

 are left to starve in their nests without any atten- 

 tion. 



The crowned pigeons of the Papuan and Solo- 

 mon islands, from the heads of which come the 

 commercial goura crests, meet with a similar and 

 if possible more brutal fate. These birds are 

 mainly terrestrial in habit and are poor fliers. 

 Instead of guns, their slayers employ clubs. The 

 birds are beaten into insensibility and their crests: 

 torn from their heads while they still breathe; 

 they are scalped and left to revive if they can. 



Birds of paradise have a better chance to sur- 



