THE TRAFFIC IN FEATHERS 

 quickly raided. The old birds were shot down and 

 the unattended young necessarily were left to starve. 

 Along the coast of Massachusetts the sea birds suf- 

 fered a like fate. Maine with its innumerable out- 

 lying rocky islands was, as it is to-day, the chief 

 nursery of the Herring Gulls and Common Terns of 

 the North Atlantic. This fact was soon discovered 

 and thousands were slaughtered every summer, their 

 wings cut off, and their bodies left to rot among the 

 nests on the rookeries. 



fVar on the Sea Swallows. — During a period of seven 

 years more than 500,000 Terns', or Sea Swallows', 

 skins were collected in spring and summer in the 

 sounds of North and South Carolina. These figures I 

 compiled from the records and accounts given me by 

 men who did the killing. Their method was to fit out 

 small sailing vessels on which they could live comfort- 

 ably and cruise for several weeks; in fact, they were 

 usually out during the entire three months of the 

 nesting period. That was the time of year that of- 

 fered best rewards for such work, for then the birds' 

 [141] 



