256 
PASSENGER PIGEON. 
river, where they were said at that time to be equally numerous. From 
the great numbers that were constantly passing over head, to or from 
that quarter, I had no doubt of the truth of this statement. The mast 
had been chiefly consumed in Kentucky, and the Pigeons, every morn- 
ing, a little before sunrise, set out for the Indiana territory, the nearest 
part of which was about sixty miles distant. Many of these returned 
before ten o'clock, and the great body generally appeared on their 
return a little after noon. 
I had left the public road, to visit the remains of the breeding place 
near Shelbyville, and was traversing the woods with my gun, in my way 
to Frankfort, when about one o'clock the Pigeons, which I had observed 
flying the greater part of the morning northerly, began to return in 
such immense numbers as I never before had witnessed. Coming to an 
opening by the side of a creek called the Benson, where I had a more 
uninterrupted view, I was astonished at their appearance. They were 
flying with great steadiness and rapidity, at a height beyond gunshot, 
in several strata deep, and so close together, that could shot have 
reached them, one discharge could not have failed of bringing down 
several individuals. From right to left as far as the eye could reach, 
the breadth of this vast procession extended; seeming everywhere 
equally crowded. Curious to determine how long this appearance would 
continue, I took out my watch to note the time, and sat down to observe 
them. It was then half past one. I sat for more than an hour, but 
instead of a diminution of this prodigious procession, it seemed rather 
to increase both in numbers and rapidity ; and, anxious to reach Frank- 
fort before night, I rose and went on. About four o'clock in the after- 
noon I crossed the Kentucky river, at the town of Frankfort, at which 
time the living torrent above my head seemed as numerous and as 
extensive as ever. Long after this I observed them, in large bodies 
that continued to pass for six or eight minutes, and these again were 
followed by other detached bodies, all moving in the same south-east 
direction, till after six in the evening. The great breadth of front 
which this mighty multitude preserved, would seem to intimate a corres- 
ponding breadth of their breeding place, which by several gentlemen 
who had lately passed through part of it, was stated to me at several 
miles. It was said to be in Green county, and that the young began 
to fly about the middle of March. On the seventeenth of April, forty- 
nine miles beyond Danville, and not far from Green river, I crossed this 
same breeding place, where the nests for more than three miles spotted 
every tree ; the leaves not being yet out, I had a fair prospect of them, 
and was really astonished at their numbers. A few bodies of Pigeons 
lingered yet in different parts of the woods, the roaring of whose wings 
was heard in various quarters around me. 
All accounts agree in stating, that each nest contains only one 
