SEPTEMBER 197 



the Supreme Court, where the judgment was con- 

 firmed, on the grounds that, as the statute prohibits 

 the killing of certain wild birds, the act of buying 

 them must be included, forasmuch as 'the principal 

 cause for killing is the consideration received, those 

 who buy the plumes of these birds must be held to 

 know that by buying them they hold out an induce- 

 ment to hunt and shoot them.' The law under which 

 this judgment was pronounced is in force in all but 

 eight of the fifty- one states. 



A few more convictions (and we are assured that 

 the American Audubon Society are determined not to 

 let matters rest) will render these plumes unsaleable 

 in the United States. We may then expect increased 

 consignments to European markets, which will entail 

 redoubled efforts on the part of the K.S.P.B. to dis- 

 suade ladies from buying these tainted goods. The 

 consignments are huge enough already. On April 16 

 of the present year (1908), in the London Commercial 

 Sale-rooms, 422 packages of 'ospreys' were offered 

 for sale, besides immense numbers of bird-of-paradise 

 skins and 62 packages of albatross quills. (Will our 

 ladies not be induced to give the Ancient Mariner a 

 second reading ?) At a sale in the same rooms on 

 June 11, 348 packages of 'ospreys' were disposed of, 

 besides five packages of osprey skins that is, skins of 

 the white egret in breeding plumage; 4244 birds of 

 paradise, 1386 heads of crowned pigeons, and no fewer 

 than 20,000 kingfishers. It is well within the power 

 of fashionable ladies to stop this inhuman traffic, 

 which is rapidly exterminating some of the most 



