AVES 



255 



the trees more than a hundred nests. The little blue heron 

 visits the creeks east of the Mississippi River. The snowy 

 heron or snowy egret is the most beautiful bird in the world. 

 Its head and back bear 

 numerous filmy plumes 

 which are so much sought 

 after to adorn the head 

 gear of women that the 

 species once so abundant 

 in Florida is now almost 

 exterminated. A law has 

 lately been passed pre- 

 venting the sale of these 

 plumes known as aigrettes. 

 That some effective means 

 to stop the use of song bird 

 plumage in millinery work 

 should be devised is evi- 

 dent when we consider the 

 number of birds annually 

 sacrificed on the altar of 

 woman's vanity. Forest 

 and Stream mentions a 

 dealer who in three months 

 supplied over eleven thou- 

 sand skins for the milliners, and the same person is said 

 to handle thirty thousand birdskins every year. A single 

 foreign order given a New York milliner called for the 

 death of over forty thousand of our beautiful birds, which 

 were sold at ten cents each. During four months seventy 

 thousand birdskins were sent from one Long Island vil- 



FIG. 292- Sparrow hawk ten inches 

 long. Photograph from life. 



