A Saint Bartholomew of Birds 223 



species, a vast number of species are close to 

 extermination. I, myself, have seen the awful 

 decimation in the lost half century. I recall 

 photographs of the aquatic life of the Saint John's 

 River, Florida, taken forty years ago. I con- 

 fess it seemed to be fairly crowded with a prodi- 

 gal wealth of bird life, the like of which I had 

 never even dreamed of, or waking, thought pos- 

 sible. When I saw the river for the first time, a 

 little over a dozen years ago, the almost com- 

 plete absence of all life was more appalling than 

 the teeming life that I still had in my mind's eye. 

 Thousands were no longer represented by tens. 

 From Jacksonville to Sanford, some two hundred 

 miles, with the exception of blackbirds, I did not 

 see altogether, fifty birds in the aggregate. With 

 a good pair of glasses I watched from the upper 

 deck, the dawn come over the lonely floods of 

 water and for a long time nothing moved upon 

 the face of the waters, and then far away some 

 fugitive remnants of the life that had been and 

 was gone. Yes! Longfellow was a prophet, had 

 seen a vision and told the story, not only of the 

 Saint John's River, but of the whole world in two 

 lines. Did I recall them or were they actually 

 spoken into my ear, so vivid and astonishing they 

 seemed : 



"The wild wind went moaning everywhere, 

 Lamenting the dead children of the air." 



