ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. 57 



by the lusty trees";* and Josselyn speaks of "the Pidgeon, of 

 which there are millions of millions. I have seen a flight of 

 Pidgeons in the spring, and at Michaelmas when they return back 

 Southward for four or five miles, that to my thinking had neither 

 beginning nor ending, length nor breadth, and so thick that I could 

 see no Sun, they join Nest to Nest, and Tree to Tree by their 

 Nests many miles together in Pine-Trees. But of late they are 

 much diminished, the English taking them in Nets."t Their 

 abundance on the Vermont border, in 1741, is thus described by 

 Williams : " The surveyor, Richard Hazen, who ran the line which 

 divides Massachusetts from Vermont, in 1741, gave this account 

 of the appearances he met with to the westward of the Connecti- 

 cut River. ' For three miles together the Pigeons' nests were so 

 thick that five hundred might have been told on the beech trees at 

 one time ; and could they have been counted on the hemlocks, as 

 well, I doubt not but five thousand at one turn round.' The re- 

 marks of the first settlers of Vermont," continues Williams, " fully 

 confirm this account. The following relation was given me, by one 

 of the earliest settlers of Clarendon [situated about fifty miles 

 north of the Massachusetts line] : ' The number of Pigeons was 

 immense. Twenty-five nests were frequently to be found on one 

 beech tree. The earth was covered with these trees, and with 

 hemlocks thus loaded with the nests of Pigeons. For an hundred 

 acres together, the ground was covered with their dung, to the 

 depth of two inches. Their noise in the evening was extremely 

 troublesome, and so great that the traveller could not get any sleep 

 where their nests were thick. About an hour after sunrise, they 

 rose in such numbers as to darken the air. When the young 

 Pigeons were grown to a considerable bigness, before they could 

 readily fly, it was common for the settlers to cut down the trees, 

 and gather a horse load in a few minutes.' The settlement of the 

 country has since set bounds to this luxuriance of animal life," 

 and these birds have been driven to other districts.}. The early 

 history of the country shows that down to about the year 1800 

 this bird was found in similar abundance, at times at least, all 

 along the Atlantic coast from Virginia to Maine, since which time 

 it has greatly decreased throughout this whole region. 



* New English Canaan, p. 60. 



+ Voyages to New England, p. 99. 



£ Natural and Civil History of Vermont, p. 114. 



