THE COMMERCIAL VALUE OF BIRDS. 27 



" aigrette " or " osprey " of commerce is obtained from 

 the Danube, where the beautiful snow-white Egrets and 

 Herons that produce it live in enormous colonies. The 

 skins of many of the beautiful Pheasants are made into 

 hats ; and most ladies are envious of a sister who is the 

 fortunate possessor of a muff made from the gorgeous 

 metallic plumes of the Impeyan. The uses to which 

 plumes are put are practically endless. They figure at 

 the bridal ceremony ; they are equally important as 

 funeral attributes. We see them in the form of graceful 

 and expensive fans in ball-room or theatre in fact, 

 wherever female society is to be found, no matter in 

 what part of the world, the fair sex seek to enhance 

 their charms by the aid of the beautiful plumage of 

 birds. 



Other but smaller branches of the feather industry are 

 the manufacture of artificial flies for fishing, some birds 

 fetching very high prices indeed for this peculiar 

 purpose. Another use to which feathers are put is the 

 manufacture of brooms, chiefly from the long narrow 

 hackles of the Barn-door Fowl and from the broader 

 feathers of Turkeys. Nor must we forget the quill-pen 

 makers who earn a livelihood by fashioning the instru- 

 ments which men of the law and bankers deem necessary 

 in compiling their mystic documents. We verily believe 

 the lawyers would consider a document illegal which 

 had been written with a vulgar steel pen nor are the 



