FEATHERS OR FLOWERS? 



AS the question which con- 

 fronted the fair sex this 

 year when about to select 

 their Easter hatsor bonnets. 



"Say flowers," pleaded the members 

 of the Audubon Society, and from the 

 many fair heads, innocent of feather 

 adornment, which bowed before the 

 lily-decked altars on Easter morning, 

 one must believe that the plea was 

 heeded. 



Nearly every large house in Chi- 

 cago, dealing wholly or in part in 

 millinery goods, was visited by a mem- 

 ber of the Audubon Society, says the 

 Tribune. One man who sells nothing 

 but millinery declared that the bird 

 protective association was nothing but 

 a fad, and that it would soon be dead. 

 He further said he would sell anything 

 for hat trimming, be it flesh, fish, or 

 fowl, that a woman zvould wear. 



Touching the question whether the 

 beautiful Terns and Gulls, with their 

 soft gray and white coloring, were to 

 be popular, it was said that they 

 would not be used as much as formerly. 

 One salesman said that he would try, 

 where a white bird was requested, to 

 get the purchaser to accept a domestic 

 Pigeon, w^hich was just as beautiful as 

 the sea and lake birds named. 



The milliners all agree that the 

 Snowy Egret is doomed to extermina- 

 tion within a short time, its plumes, 

 so fairy-like in texture, rendering its 

 use for trimming as desirable in sum- 

 mer as in winter. 



As to the birds of prey, people 

 interested in our feathered friends are 

 as desirous of saving them from 

 destruction as they are to shield the 

 song birds. There are only a few of 

 the Hawks and Owls which are 

 injurious, most of them in fact being 



beneficial. Hundreds of thousands of 

 these birds were killed for fashion's 

 sake last fall, so that this coming 

 season the farmer will note the absence 

 of these birds by the increased number 

 of rat, mouse, and rabbit pests with 

 which he will have to deal. 



It is a matter of congratulation, 

 then, to the members of the Audubon 

 Society to know that their efforts in 

 Chicago have not been wholly fruitless, 

 inasmuch as the majority of dealers in 

 women's headgear are willing to con- 

 fess that they have felt the efiect of 

 the bird protective crusade. 



Dr. H. M. Wharton, pastor of 

 Brantly Baptist Church, Baltimore, 

 has always been a bitter opponent 

 of those who slaughter birds for 

 millinery purposes. "It is wholesale 

 murder," said he, "and I am delighted 

 that a bill is to be offered in the 

 Maryland legislature for the protection 

 of song birds. I have commented 

 from the pulpit frequently upon the 

 evil of women wearing birds' wings or 



for I 

 cruel 



bodies of birds on their hats, 

 have long considered it a 

 custom." 



"Birds are our brothers and sisters,' 

 said the Rev. Hugh O. Pentecost 

 before the Unity Congregation at 

 Carnegie Music Hall, Pittsburg, a few 

 weeks ago. "If we are children of 

 God, so are they. The same intelli- 

 gence, life, and love that is in us is in 

 them. The difference between us is 

 not in kind, but in degree." 



"How is this murderous vanity of 

 women to be overcome ?" asks Our 

 Animal Friejids. "We confess we do 

 not know; but this we do know, that 

 good women can make such displays 

 of vanity disreputable, and that good 

 women ought to do it!' 



191 



