Hollick: Bird of Paradise Plumage 3 



New York Zoological Park 



under the management of the 



New York Zoological Society 



WILLIAM T. HORNADAY, Sc.D., 



Director. New York, April 16, 1917- 



Dr. Arthur Hollick, Director, 



The Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences, 

 New Brighton, N. Y. 



Dear Doctor Hollick: The bird of paradise skins that we received from 

 the Treasury Department are commercial skins, without legs or feet, and 

 could not by any possibility be mounted. They are fit to exhibit only as 

 commercial skins, as collected by plume hunters for the millinery trade. 

 I have no doubt you will be able to use some of them on that basis ; and 

 just as quick as I can get certain work off my hands that now is pressing 

 on me very heavily, I will take up this matter and will send you four of 

 these skins. 



1 regret to say that there were no aigrettes in the lot — nothing but birds 

 of paradise. Yours, very truly, 



W. T. Hornaday, 

 Director. 



July 7, 1917. 

 By the authority of the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury we hereby 

 send to the Museum of the Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences, 

 four skins of the Greater Bird of Paradise (Paradisia apoda) from the 

 lot of 527 skins that were seized at Laredo, Texas, on January 29, 1916, 

 and originally condemned for destruction. 



These skins are sent to your museum " for educational purposes," and I 

 trust they will be exhibited with a label which will explain that the birds 

 were victims of the feather millinery trade, and owe their presence in your 

 museum to the fact that their former owner sought to bring them into the 

 United States for sale contrary to law. 



- If you will kindly sign and return the enclosed receipt^ to me I will be 

 greatly obliged. Yours, very truly, 



W. T. Hornaday, 

 Director. 



2 Received from W. T. Hornaday, Director of the New York Zoological 

 Park, 4 skins of the Greater Bird of Paradise, for exhibition in the Museum 

 of the Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences, New Brighton, 

 Staten Island. 



Inasmuch as these skins have been presented to the museum for edu- 

 cational purposes, we hereby guarantee that they will be carefully guarded 

 from theft, and will not be disposed of for any kind of personal use. 



