Note on the Passenger Pigeon. — About a year and one half ago, the 
Cornell University Museum came into the possession of a mounted adult 
male Passenger Pigeon through the kindness of its collector, Mr. J. L. 
Howard of Clyde, N. Y., a justice of that city. He is now over 80 years 
old and had the bird mounted by a local taxidermist, George L. Perkins, 
who is now dead. According td Mr. Howard’s memory the bird was taken 
in 1909, 11 years after the last certain capture (Sept. 14, 1898) of a Pas- 
senger Pigeon in the State. On the bottom of the mount is the legend, 
“ Geo. L. Perkins, July 5, 1898,” — a date in close agreement with Mr. 
Wilbur’s record (Sept. 14, 1898) at Canandaigua, N. Y. The mount might 
be an old mount from some other bird. Mr. Howard’s letter follows: 
“ My account of the shooting of the Passenger Pigeon must be short 
as there was but little of it. Upon the John Heit farm about miles s. w. 
of Clyde and near the Clyde River is, and has been longer than I remember, 
a small pond nearly round and about 3 rods in diameter. A low hill upon 
the south' reaches to the water’s edge forming a sloping beach. Years ago 
this pond was in a large forest. Now this was always, as long as there 
were any pigeons, a favorite place for them to come and drink. Six years 
ago (1909) I think, I took my gun and went to this pond in hopes I might 
get a Blue Heron, which I very much wanted. There were tracks of 
herons, plover and other birds in the mud around the shores, so I sat down 
in some bushes and pulled them up around me so as to partly conceal 
myself, facing the East where I could see a long distance. Presently I saw, 
far to the East, a bird coming directly towards me. I took it to be a 
Pigeon Hawk. It flew off to my right and turned in behind me and the 
next instant I heard its wings beating for a short span and then I heard to 
my right and very near the loud and distinct crow of a Wild Pigeon. Well 
that was a surprise. I had not seen a pigeon in fifteen years or more and 
now I sat within a few feet of one and he kept on crowing. Well I went 
to work at those bushes, pulling them apart when suddenly I saw him 
standing upon the top of a fence post and still crowing. 
I picked up the gun and placed it to the shoulder and old hunter and old 
trapshooter as I was I could not hold the gun still I trembled so. But I 
took a trap-shooter’s chance and got the bird.” — S. C. Bishop and A. H. 
Wright, Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y. 
^xxxn /?/;. r. *01-1 or 
