THE SLAUGHTER OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS 287 



table. It preferred the fields and meadows to the shore 

 lines, and was the companion of the plovers of the uplands, 

 especially the golden plover. "About 1872," says Mr. 

 Forbush, "there was a great flight of these birds on Cape 

 Cod and Nantucket. They were everywhere; and enormous 

 numbers were killed. They could be bought of boys at six 

 cents apiece. Two men Idlled ^300 worth of these birds at 

 that time." 



Apparently, that was the beginning of the end of the 

 "Dough Bird," which was another name for this curlew. In 

 1908 Mr. G. H. Mackay stated that this bird and the golden 

 plover had decreased 90 per cent in fifty years, and in the 

 last ten years of that period 90 per cent of the remainder had 

 gone. "Now (1908)," says Mr. Forbush, "ornithologists be- 

 lieve that the Eskimo Curlew is practically extinct, as only 

 a few specimens have been recorded since the beginning of 

 the twentieth century." The very last record is of two speci- 

 mens collected at Waco, York County, Nebraska, in March, 

 1911, and recorded by Mr. August Eiche. Of course, it is 

 possible that other individuals may still survive; but so far 

 as our knowledge extends, the species is absolutely dead. 



In the West Indies and the Guadeloupe Islands, five species 

 of macaws and parrakeets have passed out without any serious 

 note of their disappearance on the part of the people of the 

 United States. It is at least time to write brief obituary no- 

 tices of them. 



The Cuban Tricolored Macaw, Ara tricolor (Gm.). — In 

 1875, when the author visited Cuba and the Isle of Pines, he 



