41 
time.” (Gerry.) “ Eskimo curlew, once common, have not 
been seen on Nantucket or brought into the Boston market 
as taken in Massachusetts (except an occasional bird) for a 
number of years.” (Mackay.) “ Almost extinct.” (C. L. 
Perkins, Newbury port.) These birds are either nearly ex- 
tinct in the east, or are avoiding our coasts in the migrations. 
Mr. Mackay says that the Eskimo curlew and the golden 
plover have dropped off 90 per cent in fifty years, and that 
in the last ten years 90 per cent of the remaining birds have 
disappeared. These two species almost invariably migrate 
together, and so are subject to equal decimation from gun- 
ners. 1 
The Hudsonian godwit, or “ goose bird,” as it was called 
by some Massachusetts gunners, was once perhaps as abundant 
as any of the larger shore birds on the coast. “ This bird 
was as plentiful as any bird I ever saw at Ipswich sixty 
years ago. I have not seen one now for about thirty years.” 
(Gerry.) It is now growing very rare, and, together with 
the marbled godwit, a famous bird of the olden time, is sel- 
dom seen now on our coast. “ Practically none left of either 
species.” (Mackay.) 
Vast flights of the knot, or red-breasted sandpiper, used 
to roam this coast. Fifty years ago this bird was very abun- 
dant. “ Now fallen off 98 per cent, and the red-breasted 
snipe or dowitcher is nearly in the same category.” (Mac- 
kay.) “ I have seen the red-breast at Orleans flying in 
clouds. My father killed two hundred in one day in 1848 
at Nauset Harbor. I have not seen a bird now in fifteen 
years in the same places. The marsh snipe (dowitcher) used 
to be very plentiful at Ipswich and Wellfleet. I have not 
seen one for ten years.” (Gerry.) 
Previous to 1850, when the Cape Cod railroad was com- 
pleted only to Sandwich, the knot was still a very abundant 
bird at Chatham, Nauset, Wellfleet and Billingsgate, Cape 
Cod. At the flats around Tuckernuck and Muskeget islands 
they were remarkably numerous. At this time the vicious 
1 Now (1908) ornithologists believe that the Eskimo curlew is practically ex- 
tinct, as only a few specimens have been recorded since the beginning of the twentieth 
eentury. 
