THE FEATHER CRUSADE. 
E. K. M. 
JUST as the Audubon societies and 
the appeals of humanitarians in 
general have had some effect in 
lessening the demand for the 
aigrette for millinery purposes, and 
their banishment, as officially an- 
nounced, from the helmets of the Brit- 
ish army, there springs up a new fash- 
ion which, if generally adopted, will 
prove very discouraging — especially to 
the birds. 
"She made a decided sensation last 
evening at the opera," says Miss Vani- 
ty's fond mamma. "Those blackbirds 
with outspread wings at either side of 
her head were simply fetching. They 
drew every lorgnette and every eye in 
the house upon her. Not a woman of 
fashion, or otherwise, I venture to say, 
will appear at a public function here- 
after without a pair of stuffed birds in 
her hair." 
A melancholy outlook truly, though 
as an onlooker expressed it, the effect 
of the spreading wings was vastly more 
grotesque than beautiful. The poor 
little blackbirds! Their destruction 
goes on without abatement. 
"I like the hat," said a gentle-looking 
little lady in a fashionable millinery 
establishment the other day, "but," 
removing it from her head, "those 
blackbirds must be removed and flow- 
ers put in their place." 
"A member of the Audubon Society, 
probably," queried the attendant, re- 
spectfully. 
"No," was the answer, "but for years 
the birds have been welcome visitors at 
our country place, great flocks of black- 
birds, especially, making their homes in 
our trees. This year, and indeed the 
last, but few appeared, and we have in 
consequence no love for the hunters 
and little respect for the women who, 
for vanity's sake, make their slaughter 
one of commercial necessity and greed." 
'Tis said fashion is proof against the 
appeals of common sense or morality, 
and one must accept the statement as 
true when, in spite of all that has been 
said upon the subject, the Paris journals 
announce that "birds are to be worn 
more than ever and blouses made en- 
tirely of feathers are coming into fash- 
ion." The use of bird skins in Paris for 
one week represent the destruction of 
one million three hundred thousand 
birds; in London the daily importation 
ranges from three hundred to four hun- 
dred thousand. It is honestly asserted 
that, in the height of the season, fifty 
thousand bird skins are received in 
New York City daily. 
At the annual meeting of the Audu- 
bon Society of New York state a letter 
was read from Governor Roosevelt in 
which he said that he fully sympathized 
with the purpose of the society and 
that he could not understand how any 
man or woman could fail to exert all 
influence in support of its object. 
"When I hear of the destruction of a 
species," he added, "I feel just as if all 
the works of some great writer had per- 
ished; as if one had lost all instead of 
only a part of Polybius or Livy." 
Rev. Dr. Henry Van Dyke sent a 
letter in which he said the sight of an 
aigrette filled him with a feeling of in- 
dignation, and that the skin of a dead 
songbird stuck on the head of a tune- 
less woman made him hate the barbar- 
ism which lingers in our so-called civ- 
ilization. Mr. Frank M. Chapman, at 
the same meeting, stated that the wide- 
spread use of the quills of the brown 
pelican for hat trimming was fast bring- 
ing about the extinction of that species. 
In front of my pew sits a maiden — 
A little brown wing- in her hat, 
With its touches of tropical azure, 
And the sheen of the sun upon that. 
Through the bloom-colored pane shines a 
glory 
By which the vast shadows are stirred, 
But I pine for the spirit and splendor 
That painted the wing of that bird. 
The organ rolls down its great anthem, 
With the soul of a song it is blent, 
But for me, I am sick for the singing 
Of one little song that is spent. 
The voice of the curate is gentle: 
" No sparrow shall fall to the ground;" 
But the poor broken wing on the bonnet 
Is mocking the merciful sound. 
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