438 GAME BIRDS. WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



The Baron de Lahontan, in a letter dated May 28, 1687, 

 from Boucherville, describing a flight of these birds in the 

 vicinity of Lake Champlain, says: "One would have thought, 

 that all the Turtle-Doves on Earth had chose to pass thro' 

 this place. For the eighteen or twenty days that we stayed 

 there, I firmly believe that a thousand Men might have fed 

 upon 'em heartily, without putting themselves to any trouble. 

 . . . The trees were covered with that sort of fowl more than 

 with leaves." ^ 



These great flights of Pigeons in migration extended over 

 vast tracts of country, and usually passed in their greatest 

 numbers for about three days. This is the testimony of 

 observers in many parts of the land. Afterward, flocks often 

 came along for a week or two longer. Even as late as the 

 decade succeeding 1860 such flights continued, and were still 

 observed throughout the eastern States and Canada, except 

 perhaps along the Atlantic coast. 



W. Ross King (1866) speaks of a flight at Fort Mississi- 

 saugua, Canada, which filled the air and obscured the sun for 

 fourteen hours. He believes that the flight must have 

 averaged three hundred miles in length by a mile wide. An 

 immense flight continued for several days thereafter.^ 



Wild Pigeons are not mentioned in Hampshire County, 

 Mass., records until after 1700, but undoubtedly they were 

 there when settlement began. They had a breeding place 

 near the line between Hampshire County and Vermont, and 

 their nests on the beech and hemlock trees extended for miles. 

 They were noted in Hampshire County before 1740, and many 

 were shot. Levi Moody is given by Judd as authority for the 

 statement that they were caught in such numbers in Granby 

 that not all could be sold or eaten, and after the feathers 

 had been plucked from them, many were fed to the hogs. 

 Pigeon feathers were much used for beds. In August, 1736, 

 Pigeons were sold in the Boston market at twopence per 

 dozen, and many could not be sold at that price. In 

 Northampton, from 1725 to 1785, when they could be sold. 



> Lahontan, Baron de: Some New Voyages to North America, 1703, Vol. I, pp. 61, 62. 

 2 King, W. Rosa: The Sportsman and Naturalist in Canada, 1866, p. 121. 



