ANNUAL MEETING. 147 
recently described a popular royal duchess as wearing a Bird of 
Paradise in her bonnet. 
On the other hand it is said that milliners find that their 
customers are beginning to be troubled with scruples, and state- 
ments are consequently circulated as to the large numbers of 
artificial aigrettes and other feather decorations prepared from 
fowls of various kinds killed for food. It has even been asserted 
that an unlimited supply of cast egret feathers in perfect condition 
may be had for the picking up on the walls of China ! 
These statements have been amply refuted by the highest 
authorities, but I am not aware that any collection of statistics 
exists calculated to convey an adequate idea of the rate at which 
some of the fairest species of birds have been, and are now 
being, destroyed by plume hunters. 1 have brought with me 
to-night a crowned Victoria goura pigeon, some humming birds 
and other specimens, from an auction of nearly half a million 
birds held in London on the 13th of last month (April). 
The three consignments which I saw as they came from the 
docks piled up in huge crates consisted of ; 
Osprey plumes ... 
11,352 ounces. 
Vulture plumes 
1 80J pounds. 
Peacock feathers... 
... 21 5,05 [ bundles. 
Birds of Par.idise 
2,362 
Indian parrots ... ... ... 
... 228,289 
Bronze pigeons, including the goura 
1,677 
Tannagers and sundry birds 
... 38,198 
Hummingbirds... 
... 116,490 
Jays and kingfishers 
... 48,759 
Impeyan and other pheasant and jungle fowl... 
4,952 
Owls and hawks ... 
7,163 
A similar sale took place in February, 
and others were to 
follow in July and October in the same place. At the auction of 
April 13, a Bird of Paradise of good quality sold at 25s., a 
Victoria crowned pigeon at 5s., humming birds qd. to 6d. apiece, 
according to quality. The price realised for the egret plumes 
I do not know, but it must have been large, as very high payment 
is required by the hunters on account of the permanent injury 
to health, resulting from their exposure to malaria in their ex- 
terminating work, which has to be carried on further and further 
afield as the process of devastation extends. 
According to the statement of a buyer in the Daily Telegraph 
last December, the fibre-fine plume of the egret then stood at 
los. an ounce, but had not long before touched ;^io. In con- 
cluding these remarks, which have already been longer than 1 
intended, I ask leave to read an extract from a collection of 
papers presented to an American Congress on Ornithology, and 
recently sent to Professor Newton, who has marked the following 
passages, in which Mr. J. Gilbert Pearson thus describes his own 
experience in Central Florida: — 
I visited a large colony of herons on Horse Hummock on April 27, 
1888. Several hundred pairs were nesting there at the time. Most of 
