Dallas, Texas, papers and Oklahoma papers, please copy!

As a further illustration of the spirit manifested in the South toward robins, I quote the following story from Dr. P.P. Claxton, of the University of Tennessee, as related in Audubon Educational Leaflet No. 46, by Mr. T. Gilbert Pearson:—

"The roost to which I refer," says Professor Claxton, "was situated in what is locally known as a 'cedar glade,' near Porestville, Bedford Co., Tennessee. This is a great cedar country, and robins used to come in immense numbers during the winter months, to feed on the berries.



"The spot which the roost occupied was not unlike numerous others that might have been selected. The trees grew to a height of from five to thirty feet, and for a mile square were literally loaded at night with robins. Hunting them while they roosted was a favorite sport. A man would climb a cedar tree with a torch, while his companions with poles and clubs would disturb the sleeping birds on the adjacent trees. Blinded by the light, the suddenly awakened birds flew to the torch-bearer; who, as he seized each bird would quickly pull off its head, and drop it into a sack suspended from his shoulders.



"The capture of three of four hundred birds was an ordinary night's work. Men and boys would come in wagons from all the adjoining counties and camp near the roost for the purpose of killing robins. Many times, 100 or more hunters with torches and clubs would be at work in a single night. For three years this tremendous slaughter continued in winter,—and then the survivors deserted the roost."



No: these people were not Apache Indians, led by a Geronimo who knew no mercy, no compassion. We imagine that they were mostly poor white trash, of Tennessee. One small hamlet sent to market annually enough dead robins to return $500 at five cents per dozen; which means 120,000 birds!

Last winter Mr. Edward A. McIlhenny of Avery Island, La. (south of New Iberia) informed me that every winter, during the two weeks that the holly berries are ripe thousands of robins come to his vicinity to feed upon them. "Then every negro man and boy who can raise a gun is after them. About 10,000 robins are slaughtered each day while they remain. Their dead bodies are sold in New Iberia at 10 cents each." The accompanying illustrations taken by Mr. McIlhenny shows 195 robins on one tree, and explains how such great slaughter is possible.

An officer of the Louisiana Audubon Society states that a conservative estimate of the number of robins annually killed in Louisiana for food purposes when they are usually plentiful, is a quarter of a million!

The food of the robin is as follows:

Insects, 40 per cent; wild fruit, 43 per cent; cultivated fruit, 8 per cent, miscellaneous vegetable food, 5 per cent.

SPECIAL WORK OF THE SOUTHERN NEGROES.—In 1912 a female colored servant who recently had arrived from country life in Virginia chanced to remark to me at our country home in the middle of August: "I wish I could find some birds' nests!"

"What for?" I asked, rather puzzled.

"Why, to get the aigs and eat 'em!" she responded with a bright smile and flashing teeth.

"Do you eat the eggs of wild birds?"

"Yes indeed! It's fine to get a pattridge nest! From them we nearly always git a whole dozen of aigs at once,—back where I live, in Virginia."

"Do the colored people of Virginia make a practice of hunting for the eggs of wild birds, and eating them?"

"Yes, indeed we do. In the spring and summer, when the birds are around, we used to get out every Sunday, and hunt all day. Some days we'd come back with a whole bucket full of aigs; and then we'd set up half the night, cookin' and eatin' 'em. They was awful good!"

Her face fairly beamed at the memory of it.

A few days later, this story of the doings of Virginia negroes was fully corroborated by a colored man who came from another section of that state. Three months later, after special inquiries made at my request, a gentleman of Richmond obtained further corroboration, from negroes. He was himself much surprised by the state of fact that was revealed to him.

In the North, the economic value of our song birds and other destroyers of insects and weed seeds is understood by a majority of the people, and as far as possible those birds are protected from all human enemies. But in the South, a new division of the Army of Destruction has risen into deadly prominence.

In Recreation Magazine for May, 1909, Mr. Charles Askins published a most startling and illuminating article, entitled "The South's Problem in Game Protection." It brought together in concrete form and with eye-witness reliability the impressions that for months previous had been gaining ground in the North. In order to give the testimony of a man who has seen what he describes, I shall now give numerous quotations from Mr. Askins' article, which certainly bears the stamp of truthfulness, without any "race prejudice" whatever. It is a calm, judicial, unemotional analysis of a very bad situation: and I particularly commend it alike to the farmers of the North and all the true sportsmen of the South.

In his opening paragraphs Mr. Askins describes game and hunting conditions in the South as they were down to twenty years ago, when the negroes were too poor to own guns, and shooting was not for them.

* * * * *

SPECIAL WORK OF THE SOUTHERN NEGROES.

It is all different now, says Mr. Askins, and the old days will only come back with the water that has gone down the stream. The master is with his fathers or he is whiling away his last days on the courthouse steps of the town. Perhaps a chimney or two remain of what was once the "big house" on the hill; possibly it is still standing, but as forlorn and lifeless as a dead tree. The muscadine grapes still grow in the swale and the persimmons in the pasture field, but neither 'possum nor 'coon is left to eat them. The last deer vanished years ago, the rabbits died in their baby coats and the quail were killed in June. Old "Uncle Ike" has gone across the "Great River" with his master, and his grandson glances at you askance, nods sullenly, whistles to his half breed bird dog, shoulders his three dollar gun and leaves you. He is typical of the change and has caused it, this grandson of dear old Uncle Ike.

In the same way the white man is telling the black to abide upon the plantation raising cotton and corn, and further than this nothing will be required of him. He can cheat a white man or a black, steal in a petty way anything that comes handy, live in marriage or out of it to please himself, kill another negro if he likes, and lastly shoot every wild thing that can be eaten, if only he raises the cotton and the corn. But the white sportsmen of the South have never willingly granted the shooting privilege in its entirety, and hence this story. They have told him to trap the rabbits, pot the robins, slaughter the doves, kill the song birds, but to spare the white sportsman's game, the aristocratic little bobwhite quail.

In the beginning not so much damage to southern game interests could be accomplished by our colored man and brother, however decided his inclinations. He had no money, no ammunition and no gun. His weapons were an ax, a club, a trap, and a hound dog; possibly he might own an old war musket bored out for shot. Such an outfit was not adapted to quail shooting and especially to wing shooting, with which knowledge Dixie's sportsmen were content. Let the negro ramble about with his hound dog and his war musket; he couldn't possibly kill the quail. And so Uncle Ike's grandson loafed and pottered about in the fields with his ax and his hound dogs, not doing so much harm to the quail but acquiring knowledge of the habits of the birds and skill as a still-hunting pot-hunter that would serve him well later on. The negro belongs to a primitive race of people and all such races have keener eyes than white men whose fathers have pored over lines of black and white. He learned to see the rabbit in its form, the squirrels in the leafy trees, and the quails huddled in the grass. The least shade of gray in the shadow of the creek bank he distinguished at once as a rabbit, a glinting flash from a tree top he knew instantly as being caused by the slight movement of a hidden squirrel, and the quiver of a single stem of sedge grass told him of a bevy of birds hiding in the depths. The pot-hunting negro has all the skill of the Indian, has more industry in his loafing, and kills without pity and without restraint. This grandson of Uncle Ike was growing sulky, too, with the knowledge that the white man was bribing him with half a loaf to raise cotton and corn when he might as well exact it all. And this he shortly did, as we shall see.

The time came when cotton went up to sixteen cents a pound and single breech-loading guns went down to five dollars apiece. The negro had money now, and the merchants—these men who had said let the nigger alone so long as he raises cotton and corn—sold him the guns, a gun for every black idler, man and boy, in all the South. Then shortly a wail went up from the sportsmen, "The niggers are killing our quail." They not only were killing them, but most of the birds were already dead. On the grounds of the Southern Field Club where sixty bevies were raised by the dogs in one day, within two years but three bevies could be found in a day by the hardest kind of hunting; and this story was repeated all over the South. Now the negro began to raise bird dogs in place of hounds, and he carried his new gun to church if services happened to be held on a week day. Finally the negro had grown up and had compassed his ambition: he could shoot partridges flying just the same as a white man, was a white man except for a trifling difference in color; and he could kill more birds, too, three times as many. It was merely a change from the old order to the new in which a dark-skinned "sportsman" had taken the place in plantation life of the dear old "Colonel" of loved memory. The negro had exacted his price for raising cotton and corn.



Our colored sportsman is gregarious at all times, but especially so in the matter of recreation. He may slouch about alone and pot a bevy or two of quail when in actual need of something to eat, or when he has a sale for the birds, but when it comes to shooting for fun he wants to be with the "gang." I have seen the darkies at Christmas time collect fifty in a drove with every man his dog, and spread out over the fields. Such a glorious time as he has then! A single cottontail will draw a half-dozen shots and perhaps a couple of young bucks will pour loads into a bunny after he is dead out of pure deviltry and high spirits. I once witnessed the accidental killing of a young negro on this kind of a foray. His companions loaded him into a wagon, stuck a cigar in his mouth, and tried to pour whiskey down him every time they took a drink themselves as they rode back to town. This army of black hunters and their dogs cross field after field, combing the country with fine teeth that leave neither wild animal nor bird life behind.

There comes a time toward the spring of the year after the quail season is over when the average rural darky is "between hay and grass." The merchants on whom he has depended for supplies make it a practice to refuse credit between January first and crop time. The black has spent his cotton money, his sweet potato pile has vanished, the sorghum barrel is empty, he has eaten the last of his winter's pork, and all that remains is a bit of meal and the meat his gun can secure. He is hunting in grim earnest now, using all the cunning and skill acquired by years of practice. He eats woodpeckers, jaybirds, hawks and skunks, drawing the line only at crows and buzzards. At this season of the year I have carried chicken hawks up to the cabins for the sake of watching the delight of the piccaninnies who with glowing eyes would declare, "Them's mos' as good as chicken." What happens to the robins, doves, larks, red birds, mocking birds and all songsters in this hungry season needs hardly to be stated.

It is also a time between hay and grass for the rabbits and the quail. The corn fields are bare and the weed seeds are exhausted. A spring cold spell pinches, they lose their vitality, become thin and quite lack their ordinary wariness. Then the figure-four trap springs up in the hedgerow and the sedge while the work of decimation goes more rapidly along. The rabbits can no longer escape the half-starved dogs, the thinning cover fails to hide the quail and the song birds betray themselves by singing of the coming spring.

With the growing scarcity of the game now comes the season of sedge and field burning. This is done ostensibly to prepare the land for spring plowing, but really to destroy the last refuge of the quail and rabbits so that they can be bagged with certainty. All the negroes of a neighborhood collect for one of these burnings, all their dogs, and of course all the boys from six years old up. They surround the field and set it on fire in many places, leaving small openings for the game to dash out among the motley assembly. I have seen quail fly out of the burning grass with flaming particles still attached to them. They alight on the burnt ground too bewildered to fly again and the boys and dogs pick them up. Crazed rabbits try the gauntlet amidst the barking curs, shouting negroes and popping guns, but death is sure and quick. The few quail that may escape have no refuge from the hawks and nothing to eat, so every battue of this kind marks the absolute end of the birds in one vicinity; and the next day the darkies repeat the performance elsewhere.

At this season of the year, the first of May, the blacks are putting in some of their one hundred working days while the single breech-loader rusts in the chimney corner. Surely the few birds that have escaped the foray of the "gang," lived through the hungry days, and survived their burned homes can now call "Bob White" and mate in peace. But school is out and the summer sun is putting new life into the bare feet of the half-grown boys, and the halfbreed bird dogs are busier than they were even in winter. The young rabbits are killed before they get out of the nest, and the quail eggs must be hidden rarely well that escape both the eyes of the boys and the noses of the dogs. After all it is not surprising that but three bevies remained of the sixty. Doubtless they would not, except that nature is very kind to her own in the sunny South.

Not every white man in the South is a sportsman or even a shooter; many are purely business men who have said let the "nigger" do as he likes so long as he raises cotton and buys our goods. But Dixie has her full share of true men of the out-of-doors and they have sworn in downright Southern fashion that this thing has got to end. Nevertheless their problem is deep and puzzling. In Alabama they made an effort and a beginning. They asked for a law requiring every man to obtain written permission before entering the lands of another to hunt and shoot; they asked for a resident license law taxing every gun not less than five dollars a year; for a shortened season, a bag limit, and a complete system of State wardens. Unfortunately, a lot of white farmers were in the same range as the blacks, and being hit, too, they raised a great outcry. The result was that the Alabama sportsmen got everything they asked for except the foundation of the structure they were trying to build, the high resident license or gun tax which alone could have shut out three dollar guns and saved the remnant of the game. Under the new law the sale of game was forbidden, neither could it be shipped out of the State alive or dead; the ever popular non-resident license was provided for; the season was shortened and the bag limited; the office of State game warden was created with deputies to be paid from fines; hunting upon the lands of another without written permission became a misdemeanor; and then the whole thing was nullified by reducing the resident license to nothing where a man shot upon his own land, one dollar in his own county, and two dollars outside of it. In its practical workings the new law amounts to this: A few northern gunners have paid the non-resident license fee, and enough resident licenses have been taken out by the city sportsmen to make up the handsome salary of the State warden. The negro still hunts upon his own land or upon the land of the man who wants corn and cotton raised, with perfect indifference to the whole thing. Who was to enforce the law against him? Not the one disgusted deputy with three big counties to patrol who depended for his salary upon the fines collected from the negroes. It would take one man to every three miles square to protect the game in the South.

The one effective way of dealing with the situation in Alabama was to have legislated three dollar guns out of existence with a five dollar tax, adding to this nearly a like amount on dogs. Hardly a sportsman in the South will disagree with this conclusion. But sportsmen never had a majority vote either in the South or in the North, and the South's grave problem is yet unsolved.

I do not favor depriving the black man of his natural human right to hunt and shoot. If he is the owner of land, or if he leases or rents it, or if he does not, he should have exactly the same privilege of hunting that the white man has. That is not the question now, however, but how to restrict him to legal shooting, to make him amenable to the law that governs the white man, to deprive him of the absolute license he now enjoys to kill throughout the year without mercy, without discrimination, without restraint. If only for selfish reasons, we of the North should reach to southern sportsmen a helping hand, for by and by the last of our migratory song birds will go down into Dixie and never return.

* * * * *

Mr. Askins has fairly stated a profoundly disturbing case. The remedy must contain at least three ingredients. The sportsmen of the South must stop the unjustifiable slaughter of their non-migratory game birds. As a matter of comity between states, the gentlemen of the South must pass laws to stop the killing of northern song-birds and all crop-protecting birds, for food. Finally, all men, North and South, East and West, must unite in the work that is necessary to secure the immediate enactment by Congress of a law for the federal protection of all migratory birds.

* * * * *

CHAPTER XIII

EXTERMINATION OF BIRDS FOR WOMEN'S HATS[D]

[Footnote D: In the preparation of this chapter and its illustrations, I have had much valuable assistance from Mr. C. William Beebe, who recently has probed the London feather trade almost to the bottom.]

It is high time for the whole civilized world to know that many of the most beautiful and remarkable birds of the world are now being exterminated to furnish millinery ornaments for women's wear. The mass of new information that we have recently secured on this traffic from the headquarters of the feather trade is appalling. Previously, I had not dreamed that conditions are half as bad as they are.

It is entirely fitting that on this subject New York should send a message to London. New York is almost a Spotless Town in plume-free millinery, and London and Paris are the worst places in the world. We have cleaned house. With but extremely slight exceptions, the blood of the slaughtered innocents is no longer upon our skirts, and on the subject of plumage millinery we have a right to be just as Pharisaical as we choose.

Here in New York (and also in New Jersey) no man may sell, own for sale or offer for sale the plumage of any wild American bird other than a game bird. More than that, the plumage of no foreign bird belonging to any bird family represented in the fauna of North America can be sold here! There are only a few kinds of improper "millinery" feathers that it is possible to sell here under the law. Thanks to the long and arduous campaign of the National Association of Audubon Societies, founded and for ten years directed by gallant William Dutcher, you now see on the streets of New York very, very little wild-bird plumage save that from game birds.

It is true that a few servant girls are now wearing the cast-off aigrettes of their mistresses; but they are only as one in a thousand. At Atlantic City there is said to be a fine display of servant-girl and ladies-maid aigrettes. In New York and New Jersey, in Pennsylvania for everything save the sale of heron and egret plumes (a privilege obtained by a bunko game), in Massachusetts, and in many other of our States, the wild-birds'-plumage millinery business is dead. Two years ago, when the New York legislature refused to repeal the Dutcher law, the Millinery Association asserted, and brought a cloud of witnesses to Albany to prove, that the enforcement of the law would throw thousands of operatives out of employment.



The law is in effect; and the aigrette business is dead in this state. Have any operatives starved, or been thrown out of employment? We have heard of none. They are now at work making very pretty hat ornaments of silk and ribbons, and gauze and lace; and "They are wearing them."



But even while these words are being written, there is one large fly in the ointment. The store-window of E. &. S. Meyers, 688 Broadway, New York, contains about six hundred plumes and skins of birds of paradise for sale for millinery purposes. No wonder the great bird of paradise is now almost extinct! Their sale here is possible because the Dutcher law protects from the feather dealers only the birds that belong to avian families represented in the United States. With fiendish cunning and enterprise, the shameless feather dealers are ferreting out the birds whose skins and plumes may legally be imported into this country and sold; but we will meet that with a law that will protect all foreign birds, so far as we are concerned. Now it is time for the universal enactment of a law which will prohibit the sale and use as ornaments of the plumage, feathers or skins of any wild bird that is not a legitimate game bird.

London is now the head of the giant octopus of the "feather trade" that has reached out its deadly tentacles into the most remote wildernesses of the earth, and steadily is drawing in the "skins" and "plumes" and "quills" of the most beautiful and most interesting unprotected birds of the world. The extent of this cold-blooded industry, supported by vain and hard-hearted women, will presently be shown in detail. Paris is the great manufacturing center of feather trimming and ornaments, and the French people obstinately refuse to protect the birds from extermination, because their slaughter affords employment to a certain numbers of French factory operatives.

All over the world where they have real estate possessions, the men of England know how to protect game from extermination. The English are good at protecting game—when they decide to set about it.

Why should London be the Mecca of the feather-killers of the world?

It is easily explained:

(1) London has the greatest feather market in the world; (2) the feather industry "wants the money"; and (3) the London feather industry is willing to spend money in fighting to retain its strangle-hold on the unprotected birds of the world.

Let us run through a small portion of the mass of fresh evidence before us. It will be easier for the friends of birds to read these details here than to procure them at first hand, as we have done.

The first thing that strikes one is the fact that the feather-hunters are scattered all over the world where bird life is plentiful and there are no laws to hinder their work. I commend to every friend of birds this list of the species whose plumage is to-day being bought and sold in large quantities every year in London. To the birds of the world this list is of deadly import, for it spells extermination.

The reader will notice that it is the way of the millinery octopus to reach out to the uttermost ends of the earth, and take everything that it can use. From the trackless jungles of New Guinea, round the world both ways to the snow-capped peaks of the Andes, no unprotected bird is safe. The humming-birds of Brazil, the egrets of the world at large, the rare birds of paradise, the toucan, the eagle, the condor and the emu, all are being exterminated to swell the annual profits of the millinery trade. The case is far more serious than the world at large knows, or even suspects. But for the profits, the birds would be safe; and no unprotected wild species can long escape the hounds of Commerce.

But behold the list of rare, curious and beautiful birds that are today in grave peril:



* * * * *

LIST OF BIRDS NOW BEING EXTERMINATED FOR THE LONDON AND CONTINENTAL FEATHER MARKETS:

Species. Locality. American Egret Venezuela, S. America, Mexico, etc. Snowy Egret Venezuela, S. America, Mexico, etc. Scarlet Ibis Tropical South America. "Green" Ibis Species not recognizable by its trade name. Herons, generally All unprotected regions. Marabou Stork Africa. Pelicans, all species All unprotected regions. Bustard Southern Asia, Africa. Greater Bird of Paradise New Guinea; Aru Islands. Lesser Bird of Paradise New Guinea. Red Bird of Paradise Islands of Waigiou and Batanta. Twelve-Wired Bird of Paradise New Guinea, Salwatti. Black Bird of Paradise Northern New Guinea. Rifle Bird of Paradise New Guinea generally. Jobi Bird of Paradise Island of Jobi. King Bird of Paradise New Guinea. Magnificent Bird of Paradise New Guinea. Impeyan Pheasant Nepal and India. Tragopan Pheasant Nepal and India. Argus Pheasant Malay Peninsula, Borneo. Silver Pheasant Burma and China. Golden Pheasant China. Jungle Cock East Indies and Burma. Peacock East Indies and India. Condor South America. Vultures, generally Where not protected. Eagles, generally All unprotected regions. Hawks, generally All unprotected regions. Crowned Pigeon, two species New Guinea. "Choncas" Locality unknown. Pitta East Indies. Magpie Europe. Touracou, or Plantain-Eater Africa. Velvet Birds Locality uncertain. "Grives" Locality uncertain. Mannikin South America. Green Parrot (now protected) India. "Dominos" (Sooty Tern) Tropical Coasts and Islands. Garnet Tanager South America. Grebe All unprotected regions. Green Merle Locality uncertain. "Horphang" Locality uncertain. Rhea South America. "Sixplet" Locality uncertain. Starling Europe. Tetras Locality not determined. Emerald-Breasted Hummingbird West Indies, Cent, and S. America. Blue-Throated Hummingbird West Indies, Cent, and S. America. Amethyst Hummingbird West Indies, Cent, and S. America. Resplendent Trogon, several species Central America. Cock-of-the-Rock South America. Macaw South America. Toucan South America. Emu Australia. Sun-Bird East Indies. Owl All unprotected regions. Kingfisher All unprotected regions. Jabiru Stork South America. Albatross All unprotected regions. Tern, all species All unprotected regions. Gull, all species All unprotected regions.

* * * * *

In order to throw a spot-light on the most recent transactions in the London wild-birds'-plumage market, and to furnish a clear idea of what is to-day going on in London, Paris, Berlin and Amsterdam, I will set out in some detail the report of an agent whom I engaged to ascertain the London dealings in the plumage of wild birds that were killed especially to furnish that plumage. As one item, let us take the sales in London in February, May and October, 1911, because they bring the subject well down to date. My agent's explanatory note is as follows:

"These three sales represent six months. Very nearly double this quantity is sold by these four firms in a year. We must also take into consideration that all the feathers are not brought to the London market, and that very large shipments are also made direct to the raw-feather dealers and manufacturers of Paris and Berlin, and that Amsterdam also gets large quantities from the West Indies. For your purpose, I report upon three sales, at different periods of the year 1911, and as those sales do not vary much, you will be able to judge the consumption of birds in a year."

The "aigrettes" of the feather trade come from egrets, and, being very light, it requires the death of several birds to yield one ounce. In many catalogues, the word "albatross" stands for the jabiru, a nearly-exterminated species of giant stork, inhabiting South America. "Rhea" often stands for vulture plumage.

If the feather dealers had deliberately attempted to form an educational list of the most beautiful and the most interesting birds of the world, they could hardly have done better than they have done in the above list. If it were in my power to show the reader a colored plate of each species now being exterminated by the feather trade, he would be startled by the exhibit. That the very choicest birds of the whole avian world should be thus blotted out at the behest of vain and heartless women is a shame, a disgrace and world-wide loss.

* * * * *

LONDON FEATHER SALE OF FEBRUARY, 1911

Sold by Hale & Sons Sold by Dalton & Young Aigrettes 3,069 ounces Aigrettes 1,606 ounces Herons 960 " Herons 250 " Birds of Paradise 1,920 skins Paradise 4,330 bodies

Sold by Figgis & Co. Sold by Lewis & Peat Aigrettes 421 ounces Aigrettes 1,250 ounces Herons 103 " Paradise 362 skins Paradise 414 skins Eagles 384 " Eagles 2,600 " Trogons 206 " Condors 1,580 " Hummingbirds 24,800 " Bustards 2,400 "

LONDON FEATHER SALE OF MAY, 1911

Sold by Hale & Sons Sold by Dalton & Young Aigrettes 1,390 ounces Aigrettes 2,921 ounces Herons 178 " Herons 254 " Paradise 1,686 skins Paradise 5,303 skins Red Ibis 868 " Golden Pheasants 1,000 " Junglecocks 1,550 " Parrots 1,700 " Herons 500 "

Sold by Figgis & Co. Sold by Lewis & Peat Aigrettes 201 ounces Aigrettes 590 ounces Herons 248 " Herons 190 " Paradise 546 skins Paradise 60 skins Falcons, Hawks 1,500 " Trogons 348 " Hummingbirds 6,250 "

LONDON FEATHER SALE OF OCTOBER, 1911

Sold by Hale & Sons Sold by Dalton & Young Aigrettes 1,020 ounces Aigrettes 5,879 ounces Paradise 2,209 skins Heron 1,608 " Hummingbirds 10,040 " Paradise 2,850 skins Bustard 28,000 quills Condors 1,500 " Eagles 1,900 "

Sold by Figgis & Co. Sold by Lewis & Peat Aigrettes 1,501 ounces Aigrettes 1,680 ounces Herons 140 " Herons 400 " Paradise 318 skins Birds of Paradise 700 skins

If I am correctly informed, the London feather trade admits that it requires six egrets to yield one "ounce" of aigrette plumes. This being the case, the 21,528 ounces sold as above stand for 129,168 egrets killed for nine months' supply of egret plumes, for London alone.

The total number of bird corpses auctioned during these three sales is as follows:

Aigrettes, 21,528 ounces = 129,168 Egrets. Herons, 2,683 " = 13,598 Herons. 20,698 Birds of Paradise. 41,090 Hummingbirds. 9,464 Eagles, Condors, etc. 9,472 Other Birds. ———- Total number of birds 223,490

* * * * *

It is to be remembered that the sales listed above cover the transactions of four firms only, and do not in any manner take into account the direct importations from Paris, Berlin and Amsterdam of manufacturers and other dealers. The defenders of the feather trade are at great pains to assure the world that in the monthly, bi-monthly and quarterly sales, feathers often appear in the market twice in the same year; and this statement is made for them in order to be absolutely fair. Recent examinations of the plume catalogues for an entire year, marked with the price paid for each item, reveals very few which are blank, indicating no sale! The subtractions of the duplicated items would alter the result only very slightly.

The full extent of England's annual consumption of the plumage of wild birds slaughtered especially for the trade never has been determined. I doubt whether it is possible to ascertain it. The information that we have is so fragmentary that in all probability it reflects only a small portion of the whole truth, but for all that, it is sufficient to prove the case of the Defenders of the Birds vs. the London Chamber of Commerce.

IMPORTS OF FEATHERS AND DOWN (ORNAMENTAL) FOR THE YEAR 1910

Pounds Value Venezuela 8,398 $191,058 Brazil 787 5,999 Japan 2,284 3,830 China 6,329 16,308 Tripoli 345 900 Egypt 21,047 89,486 Java, Sumatra, and Borneo 15,703 186,504 Cape of Good Hope 709,406[E] 9,747,146 British India 18,359 22,137 Hong-Kong 310 3,090 British West Indies 30 97 Other British Colonies 10,438 21,938

[Footnote E: Chiefly Ostrich feathers.]

The above does not take into account the feathers from game birds received in England from France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Belgium and the Netherlands.

As a final side-light on the quantity of egret and heron plumes offered and sold in London during the twelve months ending in April, 1912, we offer the following exhibit:

"OSPREY" FEATHERS (EGRET AND HERON PLUMES) SOLD IN LONDON DURING THE YEAR ENDING APRIL. 1912

Offered Sold Venezuelan, long and medium 11,617 ounces 7,072 ounces Venezuelan, mixed Heron 4,043 " 2,539 " Brazilian 3,335 " 1,810 " Chinese 641 " 576 "

19,636 ounces 11,997 ounces

Birds of Paradise, plumes (2 plumes = 1 bird) 29,385 24,579



Under the head of "Hummingbirds Not Wanted," Mr. Downham is at great pains to convey[F] the distinct impression that to-day hummingbirds are scorned by the feather trade, and the demand for them is dead. I believed him—until my agent turned in the following statement:

Hummingbirds sold by Lewis & Peat, London, February, 1911 24,800 Hummingbirds sold by Lewis & Peat, London, May, 1911 6,250 Hummingbirds sold by Hale & Sons, London, October, 1911 10,040 ——— Total 41,090

It is useless for anyone to assert that these birds were merely "offered," and not actually sold, as Mr. Downham so laboriously explains is the regular course with hummingbird skins; for that will deceive no intelligent person. The statement published above comes to me direct, from an absolutely competent and reliable source.

[Footnote F: "The Feather Trade," by C.F. Downham, p. 63-4.]

Undoubtedly the friends of birds, and likewise their enemies, will be interested in the prices at which the skins of the most beautiful birds of the world are sold in London, prior to their annihilation by the feather industry. I submit the following exhibit, copied from the circular of Messrs. Lewis & Peat. It is at least of academic interest.

* * * * *

PRICES OF RARE AND BEAUTIFUL BIRD SKINS IN LONDON

Condor skins $3.50 to $5.75 Condor wing feathers, each .05 Impeyan Pheasant .66 " 2.50 Argus Pheasant 3.60 " 3.85 Tragopan Pheasant 2.70 Silver Pheasant 3.50 Golden Pheasant .34 " .46 Greater Bird of Paradise: Light Plumes: Medium to giants 10.32 " 21.00 Medium to long, worn 7.20 " 13.80 Slight def. and plucked 2.40 " 6.72 Dark Plumes: Medium to good long 7.20 " 24.60 12-Wired Bird of Paradise 1.44 " 1.80 Rubra Bird of Paradise 2.50 Rifle Bird of Paradise 1.14 " 1.38 King Bird of Paradise 2.40 "Green" Bird of Paradise .38 " .44 East Indian Kingfisher .06 " .07 East Indian Parrots .03 Peacock Necks, gold and blue .24 " .66 Peacock Necks, blue and green .36 Scarlet Ibis .14 " .24 Toucan breasts .22 " .26 Red Tanagers .09 Orange Oriels .05 Indian Crows' breasts .13 Indian Jays .04 Amethyst Hummingbirds .01-1/2 Hummingbird, various 3/16 of .01 " .02 Hummingbird, others 1/32 of .01 " .01 Egret ("Osprey") skins 1.08 " 2.78 Egret ("Osprey") skins, long 2.40 Vulture feathers, per pound .36 " 4.56 Eagle, wing feathers, bundles of 100 .09 Hawk, wing feathers, bundles of 100 .12 Mandarin Ducks, per skin .15 Pheasant tail feathers, per pound 1.80 Crown Pigeon heads, Victoria 1.68 " 2.50 Crown Pigeon heads, Coronatus .84 " 1.20 Emu skins 4.56 " 4.80 Cassowary plumes, per ounce 3.48 Swan skins .72 " .74 Kingfisher skins .07 " .09 African Golden Cuckoo 1.08

* * * * *

Many thoughts are suggested by these London lists of bird slaughter and loot.

It will be noticed that the breast of the grebe has almost wholly disappeared from the feather market and from women's hats. The reason is that there are no longer enough birds of that group to hold a place in the London market! Few indeed are the Americans who know that from 1900 to 1908 the lake region of southern Oregon was the scene of the slaughter of uncountable thousands of those birds, which continued until the grebes were almost exterminated.

When the wonderful lyre-bird of Australia had been almost exterminated for its tail feathers, its open slaughter was stopped by law, and a heavy fine was imposed on exportation, amounting, I have been told, to $250 for each offense. My latest news of the lyre-bird was of the surreptitious exportation of 200 skins to the London feather market.

In India, the smuggling outward of the skins of protected birds is constantly going on. Occasionally an exporter is caught and fined; but that does not stop the traffic.

Bird-lovers must now bid farewell forever to all the birds of paradise. Nothing but the legal closing of the world's markets against their plumes and skins can save any of them. They never were numerous; nor does any species range over a wide area. They are strictly insular, and the island homes of some of them are very small. Take the great bird of paradise (Paradisea apoda) as an illustration. On Oct. 2, 1912, at Indianapolis, Indiana, a city near the center of the United States, in three show-windows within 100 feet of the headquarters of the Fourth National Conservation Congress, I counted 11 stuffed heads and 11 complete sets of plumes of this bird, displayed for sale. The prices ranged from $30 to $47.50 each! And while I looked, a large lady approached, pointed her finger at the remains of a greater bird of paradise, and with grim determination, said to her shopping companion: "There! I want one o' them, an' I'm agoin' to have it, too!"

Says Mr. James Buckland in "Pros and Cons of the Plumage Bill":

"Mr. Goodfellow has returned within the last few weeks from a second expedition to new Guinea.... One can now walk, he states, miles and miles through the former haunts of these birds [of paradise] without seeing or hearing even the commonest species. When I reflect on this sacrilege, I am lost in wonder at the apathy of the British public."

Mr. Carl Hagenbeck wrote me only three months ago that "the condors of the Andes are all being exterminated for their feathers, and these birds are now very difficult to obtain."

The egret and heron plumes, known under the trade name of "osprey, etc., feathers," form by far the most important item in each feather sale. There are fifteen grades! They are sold by the ounce, and the prices range all the way from twenty-eight cents per ounce for "mixed heron" to two hundred and twenty-five shillings ($45.60) per ounce for the best Brazilian "short selected," on February 7, 1912! Is it any wonder that in Philadelphia the prices of finished aigrettes, ready to be worn, runs from $20 to $125!

The plumes that run up into the big figures are the "short selected" coming from the following localities, and quoted at the prices set down here in shillings and pence. Count the shilling at twenty-four cents, United States money.

PRICES OF "SHORT SELECTED" EGRET AND HERON PLUMES, IN LONDON ON FEBRUARY 7, 1912

(Lewis & Peat's List)

East Indies per ounce, 117/6 to 207/6 = $49.80 max. Rangoon " " 150/0 " 192/6 = 46.20 " China " " 130/0 " 245/0 = 58.80 " Brazil " " 200/0 " 225/0 = 54.00 " Venezuela " " 165/0 " 222/6 = 53.40 "

The total offering of these "short selected" plumes in December 1911, was 689 ounces, and in February, 1912, it was 230 ounces.

Now with these enormous prices prevailing, is it any wonder that the egrets and herons are being relentlessly pursued to the uttermost ends of the earth? I think that any man who really knows the habits of egrets and herons, and the total impossibility of any quantity of their shed feathers being picked up in a marketable state, must know in his heart that if the London and continental feather markets keep open a few years longer, every species that furnishes "short selected" plumes will be utterly exterminated from off the face of the earth.

Let the English people make no mistake about this, nor be fooled by any fairy tales of the feather trade about Venezuelan "garceros," and vast quantities of valuable plumes picked off the bushes and out of the mud. Those carefully concocted egret-farm stories make lovely reading, but the reader who examines the evidence will soon decide the extent of their truthfulness. I think that they contain not even ten per cent of truth; and I shall not rest until the stories of Leon Laglaize and Mayeul Grisol have been put to the test in the regions where they originated.

A few plumes may be picked out of the jungle, yes; but as for any commercial quantity, it is at present beyond belief. Besides, we have direct, eye-witness testimony to the contrary.

It must not be inferred that the friends of birds in England have been idle or silent in the presence of the London feather trade. On the contrary, the Royal Society for the Protection of Wild Birds and Mr. James Buckland have so strongly attacked the feather industry that the London Chamber of Commerce has felt called upon to come to its rescue. Mr. Buckland, on his own individual account, has done yeoman service to the cause, and his devotion to the birds, and his tireless energy, are both almost beyond the reach of praise in words. At the last moment before going to press I learn that the birds'-plumage bill has achieved the triumph of a "first reading" in Parliament, which looks as if success is at last in sight. The powerful pamphlet that he has written, published and circulated at his own expense, entitled "Pros and Cons of the Plumage Bill," is a splendid effort. What a pity it is that more individuals are not similarly inspired to make independent effort in the protection cause! But, strange to say, few indeed are the men who have either the nerve or the ability to "go it alone."

On the introduction in Parliament of the bill to save the birds from the feather trade, it was opposed (through the efforts of the Chamber of Commerce), on the ground that if any bill against the sale of plumes should pass, and plumes could not be sold, the London business in wild-bird skins and feathers "would immediately be transferred to the continent!"

In the face of that devastating and altogether horrible prospect, and because the London feather dealers "need the money," the bill was at first defeated—to the great joy of the Chamber of Commerce and Mr. Downham; but the cause of birds will win in the end, because it is Right.

The feather dealers have been shrewdly active in the defense of their trade, and the methods they have employed for influencing public opinion have quite outshone those put forth by their brethren in America. I have before me a copy of a booklet bearing the name of Mr. C.F. Downham as the author, and the London Chamber of Commerce has loaned its good name as publisher. Altogether it is a very shrewd piece of work, even though its arguments in justification of bird slaughter for the feather market are too absurd and weak for serious consideration.

The chief burden of the defender of bird slaughter for millinery purposes is on account of the destruction of egrets and herons, but particularly the former. To offset as far as possible the absolutely true charge that egrets bear their best plumes in their breeding season, when the helpless young are in the nest and the parent birds must be killed to obtain the plumes, the feather trade has obtained from three Frenchmen—Leon Laglaize, Mayeul Grisol, and F. Geay—a beautiful and plausible story to the effect that in Venezuela the enormous output of egret plumes has been obtained by picking up, off the bushes and out of the water and mud, the shed feathers of those birds! According to the story, Venezuela is full of egret farms, called "garceros,"—where the birds breed and moult under strict supervision, and kindly drop their feathers in such places that it is possible to find them, and to pick them up, in a high state of preservation! And we are asked to believe that it is these very Venezuelan picked-up feathers that command in London the high price of $44 per ounce.



Mr. Laglaize is especially exploited by Mr. Downham, as a French traveler of high standing, and well known in the zoological museums of France; but, sad to say, when Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn cabled to the Museum of Natural History in Paris, inquiring about Mr. Laglaize, the cable flashed back the one sad word; "Inconnu!" (Unknown!)

I think it entirely possible that enough shed feathers have been picked up in the reeking swamps of Venezuela, on the upper tributaries of the Orinoco, to afford an excuse for the beautiful story of Mr. Laglaize. Any shrewd individual with money, and the influence that money secures, could put up just such a "plant" as I firmly believe has been put up by some one in Venezuela. I will guarantee that I could accomplish such a job in Venezuela or Brazil, in four months' time, at an expense not exceeding one thousand dollars.

That the great supply of immaculately perfect egret plumes that annually come out of Venezuela could by any possibility be picked up in the swamps where they were shed and dropped by the egrets, is entirely preposterous and incredible. The whole proportion is denounced by several men of standing and experience, none of whom are "inconnu."

As a sweeping refutation of the fantastic statements regarding "garceros," published by Mr. Downham as coming from Messrs. Laglaize, Grisol and Geay, I offer the written testimony of an American gentleman who at this moment owns and maintains within a few yards of his residence a large preserve of snowy egrets and herons, the former representing the species which furnishes egret plumes exactly similar to those shipped from Venezuela and Brazil. If the testimony of Mr. McIlhenny is not sufficient to stamp the statements of the three Frenchmen quoted by Mr. Downham as absolute and thoroughly misleading falsehoods, then there is no such thing in this world as evidence. I suggest a perusal of the statements of the three Frenchmen who are quoted with such confidence by Mr. Downham and published by the Hon. Chamber of Commerce at London, and then a careful reading of the following letter:

Avery Island, La., June 17, 1912.

DEAR MR. HORNADAY:—

I have before me your letter of June 8th, asking for information as to whether or no egrets shed their plumes at their nesting places in sufficient quantities to enable them to be gathered commercially. I most emphatically wish to state that it is impossible to gather at the nesting places of these birds any quantity of their plumes. I have nesting within 50 yards of where I am now sitting dictating this letter not less than 20,000 pairs of the various species of herons and egrets, and there are fully 2,500 pairs of snowy herons nesting within my preserve.

During the nesting season, which covers the months of April, May and June, I am through this heronry in a small canoe almost every day, and often twice a day. I have had these herons under my close inspection for the past 17 years, and I have not in any one season picked up or seen more than half a dozen discarded plumes. Such plumes as I have picked up, I have kept on my desk, and given to the people who were interested. I remember that last year I picked up four plumes of the snowy heron that were in one bunch. I think these must have been plucked out by the birds fighting.

This year I have found only one plume so far. I enclose it herewith. You will notice that it is one of the shorter plumes, and is badly worn at the end, as have been all the plumes which I have picked up in my heronry.

I am positive that it is not possible for natural shed plumes to be gathered commercially. I have a number of times talked with plume hunters from Venezuela and other South American countries, and I have never heard of any egret feathers being gathered by their being picked up after the birds have shed them.

I have heard of a number of heronries in South America that are protected by the land owners for the purpose of gathering a yearly crop of egret plumes, but this crop is gathered always by shooting a certain percentage of the birds. This shooting is done by experts with 22-calibre rifles, and does not materially disturb the nesting colony. I have known of two men who have been engaged in killing the birds on large estates in South America, who were paid regular salaries for their services as egret hunters.

Very truly yours,

E.A. McIlhenny.

I am more than willing to set the above against the fairy tale of Mr. Laglaize.

Here is the testimony of A.H. Meyer, an ex-plume-hunter, who for nine years worked in Venezuela. His sworn testimony was laid before the Legislature of the State of New York, in 1911, when the New York Milliners' Association was frantically endeavoring to secure the repeal of the splendid Dutcher law. This witness was produced by the National Association of Audubon Societies.

"My attention has been called to the fact that certain commercial interests in this city are circulating stories in the newspapers and elsewhere to the effect that the aigrettes used in the millinery trade come chiefly from Venezuela, where they are gathered from the ground in the large garceros, or breeding-colonies, of white herons.

"I wish to state that I have personally engaged in the work of collecting the plumes of these birds in Venezuela. This was my business for the years 1896 to 1905, inclusive. I am thoroughly conversant with the methods employed in gathering egret and snowy heron plumes in Venezuela, and I wish to give the following statement regarding the practices employed in procuring these feathers:

"The birds gather in large colonies to rear their young. They have the plumes only during the mating and nesting season. After the period when they are employed in caring for their young, it is found that the plumes are virtually of no commercial value, because of the worn and frayed condition to which they have been reduced. It is the custom in Venezuela to shoot the birds while the young are in the nests. A few feathers of the large white heron (American egret), known as the Garza blanca, can be picked up of a morning about their breeding places, but these are of small value and are known as "dead feathers." They are worth locally not over three dollars an ounce; while the feathers taken from the bird, known as "live feathers," are worth fifteen dollars an ounce.

"My work led me into every part of Venezuela and Colombia where these birds are to be found, and I have never yet found or heard of any garceros that were guarded for the purpose of simply gathering the feathers from the ground. No such condition exists in Venezuela. The story is absolutely without foundation, in my opinion, and has simply been put forward for commercial purposes.

"The natives of the country, who do virtually all of the hunting for feathers, are not provident in their nature, and their practices are of a most cruel and brutal nature. I have seen them frequently pull the plumes from wounded birds, leaving the crippled birds to die of starvation, unable to respond to the cries of their young in the nests above, which were calling for food. I have known these people to tie and prop up wounded egrets on the marsh where they would attract the attention of other birds flying by. These decoys they keep in this position until they die of their wounds, or from the attacks of insects. I have seen the terrible red ants of that country actually eating out the eyes of these wounded, helpless birds that were tied up by the plume-hunters. I could write you many pages of the horrors practiced in gathering aigrette feathers in Venezuela by the natives for the millinery trade of Paris and New York.

"To illustrate the comparatively small number of dead feathers which are collected, I will mention that in one year I and my associates shipped to New York eighty pounds of the plumes of the large heron and twelve pounds of the little recurved plumes of the snowy heron. In this whole lot there were not over five pounds of plumes that had been gathered from the ground—and these were of little value. The plume-birds have been nearly exterminated in the United States and Mexico, and the same condition of affairs will soon exist in tropical America. This extermination will come about because of the fact that the young are left to starve in the nest when the old birds are killed, any other statement made by interested parties to the contrary notwithstanding.

"I am so incensed at the ridiculously absurd and misleading stories that are being published on this question that I want to give you this letter, and, before delivering it to you, shall take oath to its truthfulness."

Here is the testimony of Mr. Caspar Whitney, of New York, formerly editor of Outing Magazine and Outdoor America:

"During extended travel throughout South America, from 1903 to 1907, inclusive, I journeyed, on three separate occasions, by canoe (1904-1907), on the Lower Orinoco and Apure rivers and their tributaries. This is the region, so far as Venezuela is concerned, in which is the greatest slaughter of white herons for their plumage, or more specifically for the marital plumes, which are carried only in the mating and breeding season, and are known in the millinery trade as 'aigrettes.'

"There is literally no room for question. The snowy herons are killed exactly as I describe. It is the custom of all those who hunt for the millinery trade, and is recognized by the natives as the usual method."

Here is the testimony of Mr. Julian A. Dimock, of Peekamose, N.Y., the famous outdoor photographer, and illustrator of "Florida Enchantments":

"I know a goodly number of the plume-hunters of Florida. I have camped with them, and talked to them. I have heard their tales, and even full accounts of the 'shooting-up' of an egret rookery. Never has a man in Florida suggested to me that plumes could be obtained without killing the birds. I have known the wardens, and have visited rookeries after they had been 'shot-up,' and the evidence all pointed to the everlasting use of the gun. It is certainly not true that the plumes can be obtained without killing the birds bearing them.

"Nineteen years ago, I visited the Cuthbert Rookery with one of the men who discovered the birds nesting in that lake. He and his partner had sold the plumes gathered there for more than a thousand dollars. He showed me how they hid in the bushes and shot the birds. He even gave me a chance to watch him kill two or three birds.

"I know personally the man chiefly responsible for the slaughter of the birds at Alligator Bay. He laughed at the idea of getting plumes without killing the birds! I well know the man who shot the birds up Rogers River, and even saw some of the empty shells left on the ground by him.



I have camped with Seminoles, whites, blacks, outlaws, and those within the pale, connected with plume-hunting, and all tell the same story: The birds are shot to get the plumes. The evidence of my own eyes, and the action of the birds themselves, convinces me that there is not a shadow of doubt concerning this point."

This sworn testimony from Mr. T.J. Ashe, of Key West, Florida, is very direct and to the point:

"I have seen many moulted and dropped feathers from wild plumed birds. I have never seen a moulted or dropped feather that was fit for anything. It is the exception when a plumed bird drops feathers of any value while in flight. Whatever feathers are so dropped are those that are frayed, worn out, and forced out by the process of moulting. The moulting season is not during the hatching season, but is after the hatching season. The shedding, or moulting, takes place once a year; and during this moulting season the feathers, after having the hard usage of the year from wind, rain and other causes, when dropped are of absolutely no commercial value."

Mr. Arthur T. Wayne, of Mount Pleasant, S.C., relates in sworn testimony his experience in attempting to secure egret plumes without killing the birds:

"It is utterly impossible to get fifty egret plumes from any colony of breeding birds without shooting the birds. Last spring, I went twice a week to a breeding colony of American and snowy egrets, from early in April until June 8. Despite the fact that I covered miles of territory in a boat, I picked up but two American egret plumes (which I now have); but not a single snowy egret plume did I see, nor did my companion, who accompanied me on every trip.

"I saw an American egret plume on the water, and left it, purposely, to see whether it would sink or not. Upon visiting the place a few days afterwards, the plume was not in evidence, undoubtedly having sunk. The plumes are chiefly shed in the air while the birds are going to or coming from their breeding grounds. If that millinery plume law is repealed, the fate of the American and snowy egrets is sealed, for the few birds that remain will be shot to the very last one."

Any man who ever has been in an egret rookery (and I have) knows that the above testimony is true! The French story of the beautiful and smoothly-running egret farms in Venezuela is preposterous, save for a mere shadow of truth. I do not say that no egret plumes could be picked up, but I do assert that the total quantity obtainable in one year in that way would be utterly trivial.

No; the "ospreys" of the British feather market come from slaughtered egrets and herons, killed in the breeding season. Let the British public and the British Parliament make no mistake about that. If they wish the trade to continue, let it be based on the impregnable ground that the merchants want the money, and not on a fantastic dream that is too silly to deceive even a child that knows birds.

The use or disuse of wild birds' plumage as millinery ornaments is another of those wild-life subjects regarding which there is no room for argument. To assert that the feather-dealers want the business for the money it brings them is not argument! We have seen many a steam roller go over Truth, and Right, and Justice, by main strength and red-hot power; but Truth and Right refuse to stay flat down. There is on this earth not one wild-animal species—mammal, bird or reptile—that can long withstand exploitation for commercial purposes. Even the whales of the deep sea, the walrus of the arctic regions, the condors of the Andes and alligators of the Everglade morasses are no exception to the universal rule.

In Mr. Downham's book there is much fallacious reasoning, and many conclusions that are not borne out by the facts. For example, he says that no species of bird of paradise has been diminished in number by slaughter for the feather trade; that Florida still contains a supply of egrets; that the decrease in bird life should be charged to the spread of cities, towns and farms, and not to the trade; that the trade was "in no way responsible" for the slaughter of three hundred thousand gulls and albatrosses on Laysan Island!

I have space to notice one other important erroneous conclusion that Mr. Downham publishes in his book, on page 105. He says:

"The destruction of birds in foreign countries is something that no trade can direct or control."

This is an amazing declaration; and absolutely contrary to experience. Let me prove what I say by a fresh and incontestable illustration:

Prior to April, 1911, when Governor Dix signed the Bayne law against the sale of wild native game in the State of New York, Currituck County, N.C., was a vast slaughter-pen for wild fowl. No power or persuasion had availed to induce the people of North Carolina to check, or regulate, or in any manner mitigate that slaughter of geese, ducks and swans. It was estimated that two hundred thousand wild fowl were annually slaughtered there.

We who advocated the Bayne law said: "Close the New York markets against Currituck birds, and you will stop a great deal of the slaughter."

We cleaned our Augean stable. The greatest game market in America was absolutely closed.

Last winter (1911) the annual killing of wild fowl was fully fifty per cent less than during previous years. In one small town, twenty professional duck shooters went entirely out of business—because they couldn't sell their ducks! The dealers refused to buy them. The result was exactly what we predicted it would be; and this year, it is reported over and over that ducks are more plentiful in New England than they have been in twenty years previously! The result is wonderful, because so quick.

Beyond all question, the feather merchants of London, Paris and Berlin absolutely control the bird-killers of Venezuela, China, New Guinea. Mexico and South America. Let the word go forth that "the trade" is no longer permitted to buy and sell egret and heron plumes, skins of birds of paradise and condor feathers, and presto! the killing industry falls dead the next moment.



Yes, indeed, members of the British Parliament: it is easily within your power to wipe out at a single stroke fully one-half of the bird slaughter for fancy feathers. It can be done just as we wiped out one-half the annual duck slaughter in wickedly-wasteful North Carolina!

The feather trade absolutely does control the killing situation! Now, will the people of England clean house by controlling the feather trade? If a hundred species of the most beautiful birds of the world must be exterminated for the feather trade, let the odium rest elsewhere than on the people of England.

The bird-lovers of America may rest assured that the bird-lovers of England—a mighty host—are neither careless nor indifferent regarding the wild-birds' plumage business. On the contrary, several bills have been brought before Parliament intended to regulate or prohibit the traffic, and a measure of vast importance to the birds of the world is now before the House of Commons. It is backed by Mr. Percy Alden, M.P., by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, by the Selbourne Society, and by Mr. James Buckland—a host in himself. For years past that splendidly-equipped and well-managed Royal Society has waged ceaseless warfare for the birds. Its activity has been tremendous, and its membership list contains many of the finest names in England. The address of the Honorary Secretary, Frank E. Lemon, Esq., is 23 Queen Anne's Gate, London, S.W.

Naturally, these influences are opposed by the Textile Trade Section of the London Chamber of Commerce, and their only argument consists of the plea that if London doesn't get the money out of the feather trade, the Continent will get it! A reasonable, logical, magnificent and convincing excuse for wholesale bird slaughter, truly!

Mr. Buckland has been informed from the Continent that the people of France, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium are waiting and watching to see what England is going to do with the question, "To slaughter, or not to slaughter?" For England has no monopoly of the birds' plumage trade, not by any means. Says Mr. Buckland ("Pros and Cons of the Plumage Bill," page 17):

"As regards the vast majority of fancy feathers used in millinery, the Continent receives its own supplies. The feathers of the hundreds of thousands of albatrosses which are killed in the North Pacific all go to Paris. Of the untold thousands of 'magpies,' owls, and other species which come from Peru, not one skin or feather crosses the Channel. The white herons of the Upper Senegal and the Niger are being rapidly exterminated at the instigation of the feather merchants, but not one of the plumes reaches London. Paris receives direct a large supply of aigrettes from South America and elsewhere.... The millions of swallows and other migratory birds which are killed annually as they pass through Italy, France and Spain on their way north, supply the millinery trade of Europe with an incredible quantity of wings and other plumage, but none of it is distributed from London.... London, as a distributing center, has no monopoly of the trade in raw feathers."

Mr. Buckland's green-covered pamphlet is a powerful document, and both his facts and his conclusions seem to be unassailable. The author's address is Royal Colonial Institute, Northumberland Ave., London, W.C.

The duty of the civilized nations of Europe is perfectly plain. The savage and bloody business in feathers torn from wild birds should be stopped, completely and forever. If the commons will not arise and reform the odious business out of existence, then the kings and queens and presidents should do their plain duty. In the suppression of a world crime like this it is clearly a case of noblesse oblige!

* * * * *

CHAPTER XIV.

THE BIRD TRAGEDY ON LAYSAN ISLAND

This chapter is a curtain-dropper to the preceding chapter. As a clearly-cut, concrete case, the reader will find it unique and unsurpassed. It should be of lively interest to every American because the tragedy occurred on American territory.

In the far-away North Pacific Ocean, about seven hundred miles from Honolulu west-b'-north, lies the small island of Laysan. It is level, sandy, poorly planted by nature, and barren of all things likely to enlist the attention of predatory man. To the harassed birds of mid-ocean, it seemed like a secure haven, and for ages past it has been inhabited only by them. There several species of sea birds, large and small, have found homes and breeding places. Until 1909, the inhabitants consisted of the Laysan albatross, black-footed albatross, sooty tern, gray-backed tern, noddy tern, Hawaiian tern, white tern, Bonin petrel, two shearwaters, the red-tailed tropic bird, two boobies and the man-of-war bird.

Laysan Island is two miles long by one and one-half miles broad, and at times it has been literally covered with birds. Its bird life was first brought prominently to notice in 1891, by Henry Palmer, the agent of Hon. Walter Rothschild, and in 1902 and 1903 Walter K. Fisher and W.A. Bryan made further observations.

Ever since 1891 the bird life on Laysan has been regarded as one of the wonders of the bird world. One of the photographs taken prior to 1909 shows a vast plain, apparently a square mile in area, covered and crowded with Laysan albatrosses. They stand there on the level sand, serene, bulky and immaculate. Thousands of birds appear in one view—a very remarkable sight.

Naturally man, the ever-greedy, began to cast about for ways by which to convert some product of that feathered host into money. At first guano and eggs were collected. A tramway was laid down and small box-cars were introduced, in which the collected material was piled and pushed down to the packing place.

For several years this went on, and the birds themselves were not molested. At last, however, a tentacle of the feather-trade octopus reached out to Laysan. In an evil moment in the spring of 1909, a predatory individual of Honolulu and elsewhere, named Max Schlemmer, decided that the wings of those albatross, gulls and terns should be torn off and sent to Japan, whence they would undoubtedly be shipped to Paris, the special market for the wings of sea-birds slaughtered in the North Pacific.



Schlemmer the Slaughterer bought a cheap vessel, hired twenty-three phlegmatic and cold-blooded Japanese laborers, and organized a raid on Laysan. With the utmost secrecy he sailed from Honolulu, landed his bird-killers upon the sea-bird wonderland, and turned them loose upon the birds.

For several months they slaughtered diligently and without mercy. Apparently it was the ambition of Schlemmer to kill every bird on the island.

By the time the bird-butchers had accumulated between three and four car-loads of wings, and the carnage was half finished, William A. Bryan, Professor of Zoology in the College of Honolulu, heard of it and promptly wired the United States Government.

Without the loss of a moment the Secretary of the Navy despatched the revenue cutter Thetis to the shambles of Laysan. When Captain Jacobs arrived he found that in round numbers about three hundred thousand birds had been destroyed, and all that remained of them were several acres of bones and dead bodies, and about three carloads of wings, feathers and skins. It was evident that Schlemmer's intention was to kill all the birds on the island, and only the timely arrival of the Thetis frustrated that bloody plan.

The twenty-three Japanese poachers were arrested and taken to Honolulu for trial, and the Thetis also brought away all the stolen wings and plumage with the exception of one shedful of wings that had to be left behind on account of lack of carrying space. That old shed, with one end torn out, and supposed to contain nearly fifty thousand pairs of wings, was photographed by Prof. Dill in 1911, as shown herewith.



Three hundred thousand albatrosses, gulls, terns and other birds were butchered to make a Schlemmer holiday! Had the arrival of the Thetis been delayed, it is reasonably certain that every bird on Laysan would have been killed to satisfy the wolfish rapacity of one money-grubbing white man.

In 1911, the Iowa State University despatched to Laysan a scientific expedition in charge of Prof. Homer R. Dill. The party landed on the island on April 24 and remained until June 5, and the report of Professor Dill (U.S. Department of Agriculture) is consumedly interesting to the friends of birds. Here is what he has said regarding the evidences of bird-slaughter:

"Our first impression of Laysan was that the poachers had stripped the place of bird life. An area of over 300 acres on each side of the buildings was apparently abandoned. Only the shearwaters moaning in their burrows, the little wingless rail skulking from one grass tussock to another, and the saucy finch remained. It is an excellent example of what Prof. Nutting calls the survival of the inconspicuous.

"Here on every side are bones bleaching in the sun, showing where the poachers had piled the bodies of the birds as they stripped them of wings and feathers. In the old open guano shed were seen the remains of hundreds and possibly thousands of wings which were placed there but never cured for shipping, as the marauders were interrupted in their work.



"An old cistern back of one of the buildings tells a story of cruelty that surpasses anything else done by these heartless, sanguinary pirates, not excepting the practice of cutting wings from living birds and leaving them to die of hemorrhage. In this dry cistern the living birds were kept by hundreds to slowly starve to death. In this way the fatty tissue lying next to the skin was used up, and the skin was left quite free from grease, so that it required little or no cleaning during preparation.

"Many other revolting sights, such as the remains of young birds that had been left to starve, and birds with broken legs and deformed beaks were to be seen. Killing clubs, nets and other implements used by these marauders were lying all about. Hundreds of boxes to be used in shipping the bird skins were packed in an old building. It was very evident they intended to carry on their slaughter as long as the birds lasted.

"Not only did they kill and skin the larger species but they caught and caged the finch, honey eater, and miller bird. Cages and material for making them were found."—(Report of an Expedition to Laysan Island in 1911. By Homer R. Dill, page 12.)

The report of Professor Bryan contains the following pertinent paragraphs:

"This wholesale killing has had an appalling effect on the colony.... It is conservative to say that fully one-half the number of birds of both species of albatross that were so abundant everywhere in 1903 have been killed. The colonies that remain are in a sadly decimated condition.... Over a large part of the island, in some sections a hundred acres in a place, that ten years ago were thickly inhabited by albatrosses not a single bird remains, while heaps of the slain lie as mute testimony of the awful slaughter of these beautiful, harmless, and without doubt beneficial inhabitants of the high seas.

"While the main activity of the plume-hunters was directed against the albatrosses, they were by no means averse to killing anything in the bird line that came in their way.... Fortunately, serious as were the depredations of the poachers, their operations were interrupted before any of the species had been completely exterminated."

But the work of the Evil Genius of Laysan did not stop with the slaughter of three hundred thousand birds. Mr. Schlemmer introduced rabbits and guinea-pigs; and these rapidly multiplying rodents now are threatening to consume every plant on the island. If the plants disappear, many of the insects will go with them; and this will mean the disappearance of the small insectivorous birds.

In February, 1909, President Roosevelt issued an executive order creating the Hawaiian Islands Reservation for Birds. In this are included Laysan and twelve other islands and reefs, some of which are inhabited by birds that are well worth preserving. By this act, we may feel that for the future the birds of Laysan and neighboring islets are secure from further attacks by the bloody-handed agents of the vain women who still insist upon wearing the wings and feathers of wild birds.

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CHAPTER XV

UNFAIR FIREARMS, AND SHOOTING ETHICS

For considerably more than a century, the States of the American Union have enacted game-protective laws based on the principle that the wild game belongs to the People, and the people's senators, representatives and legislators generally may therefore enact laws for its protection, prescribing the manner in which it may and may not be taken and possessed. The soundness of this principle has been fully confirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Geer vs. Connecticut, on March 2, 1896.

The tendency of predatory man to kill and capture wild game of all kinds by wholesale methods is as old as the human race. The days of the club, the stone axe, the bow and arrow and the flint-lock gun were contemporaneous with the days of great abundance of game. Now that the advent of breech-loaders, repeaters, automatics and fixed ammunition has rendered game scarce in all localities save a very few, the thoughtful man is driven to consider measures for the checking of destruction and the suppression of wholesale slaughter.

First of all, the deadly floating batteries and sail-boats were prohibited. To-day a punt gun is justly regarded as a relic of barbarism, and any man who uses one places himself beyond the pale of decent sportsmanship, or even of modern pot-hunting. Strange to say, although the unwritten code of ethics of English sportsmen is very strict, the English to this day permit wild-fowl hunting with guns of huge calibre, some of which are more like shot-cannons than shot-guns. And they say, "Well, there are still wild duck on our coast!"

Beyond question, it is now high time for the English people to take up the shot-gun question, and consider what to-day is fair and unfair in the killing of waterfowl. The supply of British ducks and geese can not forever withstand the market gunners and their shot-cannons. Has not the British wild-fowl supply greatly decreased during the past fifteen years? I strongly suspect that a careful investigation would reveal the fact that it has diminished. The Society for the Preservation of the Fauna of the Empire should look into the matter, and obtain a series of reports on the condition of the waterfowl to-day as compared with what it was twenty years ago.

In the United States we have eliminated the swivel guns, the punt guns and the very-big-bore guns. Among the real sportsmen the tendency is steadily toward shot-guns of small calibre, especially under 12-gauge. But, outside the ranks of sportsmen, we are now face to face with two automatic and five "pump" shotguns of deadly efficiency. Of these, more than one hundred thousand are being made and sold annually by the five companies that produce them. Recently the annual output has been carefully estimated from known facts to be about as follows:

Winchester Arms Co., New Haven, Conn. (1 Automatic and 1 Pump-gun) 50,000 guns. Remington Arms Co., Ilion, N.Y. (1 Automatic and 1 Pump-gun) 25,000 " Marlin Fire Arms Co., New Haven, Conn. 1 Pump-gun 12,000 " Stevens Arms Co., Chicopee Falls, Mass. 1 Pump-gun 10,000 " Union Fire Arms Co., 1 Pump-gun 5,000 " —————— 103,000 guns



THE ETHICS OF SHOOTING AND SHOT-GUNS.—Are the American people willing that their wild birds shall be shot by machinery?

In the ethics of sportsmanship, the anglers of America are miles ahead of the men who handle the rifle and shot-gun in the hunting field. Will the hunters ever catch up?

The anglers have steadily diminished the weight of the rod and the size of the line; and they have prohibited the use of gang hooks and nets. In this respect the initiative of the Tuna Club of Santa Catalina is worthy of the highest admiration. Even though the leaping tuna, the jewfish and the sword-fish are big and powerful, the club has elected to raise the standard of sportsmanship by making captures more difficult than ever before. A higher degree of skill, and nerve and judgment, is required in the angler who would make good on a big fish; and, incidentally, the fish has about double "the show" that it had fifteen years ago.

That is Sportsmanship!

But how is it with the men who handle the shot-gun?

By them, the Tuna Club's high-class principle has been exactly reversed! In the making of fishing-rods, commercialism plays small part; but in about forty cases out of every fifty the making of guns is solely a matter of dollars and profits.

Excepting the condemnation of automatic and pump guns, I think that few clubs of sportsmen have laid down laws designed to make shooting more difficult, and to give the game more of a show to escape. Thousands of gentlemen sportsmen have their own separate unwritten codes of honor, but so far as I know, few of them have been written out and adopted as binding rules of action. I know that among expert wing shots it is an unwritten law that quail and grouse must not be shot on the ground, nor ducks on the water. But, among the three million gunners who annually shoot in the United States how many, think you, are there who in actual practice observe any sentimental principles when in the presence of killable game? I should say about one man and boy out of every five hundred.

Up to this time, the great mass of men who handle guns have left it to the gunmakers to make their codes of ethics, and hand them out with the loaded cartridges, all ready for use.

For fifty years the makers of shot-guns and rifles have taxed their ingenuity and resources to make killing easier, especially for "amateur" sportsmen,—and take still greater advantages of the game! Look at this scale of progression:

FIFTY YEARS' INCREASE IN THE DEADLINESS OF FIREARMS.

KIND OF GUN. ESTIMATED DEGREE OF DEADLINESS.

Single-shot muzzle loader xx 10 Single-shot breech-loader xxxxxx 30 Double-barrel breech-loader xxxxxxxxxx 50 Choke-bore breech-loader xxxxxxxxxxxx 60 Repeating rifle xxxxxxxxxxxx 60 Repeating rifle, with silencer xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 70 "Pump" shot-gun (6 shots) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 90 Automatic or "autoloading" shot-guns, 5 shots xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 100

The Output of 1911.—At a recent hearing before a committee of the House of Representatives at Washington, a representative of the gun-making industry reported that in the year 1911 ten American manufacturing concerns turned out the following:

391,875 shot-guns, 666,643 rifles, and 580,042 revolvers.

There are 66 factories producing firearms and ammunition, employing $39,377,000 of invested capital and 15,000 employees.

The sole and dominant thought of many gunmakers is to make the very deadliest guns that human skill can invent, sell them as fast as possible, and declare dividends on their stock. The Remington, Winchester, Marlin, Stevens and Union Companies are engaged in a mad race to see who can turn out the deadliest guns, and the most of them. On the market to-day there are five pump-guns, that fire six shots each, in about six seconds, without removal from the shoulder, by the quick sliding of a sleeve under the barrel, that ejects the empty shell and inserts a loaded one. There are two automatics that fire five shots each in five seconds or less, by five pulls on the trigger! The autoloading gun is reloaded and cocked again wholly by its own recoil. Now, if these are not machine guns, what are they?

In view of the great scarcity of feathered game, and the number of deadly machine guns already on the market, the production of the last and deadliest automatic gun (by the Winchester Arms Company), already in great demand, is a crime against wild life, no less.

Every human action is a matter of taste and individual honor.

It is natural for the duck-butchers of Currituck to love the automatic shot-guns as they do, because they kill the most ducks per flock. With two of them in his boat, holding ten shots, one expert duck-killer can,—and sometimes actually does, so it is said,—get every duck out of a flock, up to seven or eight.

It is natural for an awkward and blundering wing-shot to love the deadliest gun, in order that he may make as good a bag as an expert shot can make with a double-barreled gun. It is natural for the hunter who does not care a rap about the extermination of species to love the gun that will enable him to kill up to the bag limit, every time he takes the field. It is natural for men who don't think, or who think in circles, to say "so long as I observe the lawful bag limit, what difference does it make what kind of a gun I use?"

It is natural for the Remington, and Winchester, and Marlin gun-makers to say, as they do, "Enforce the laws! Shorten the open seasons! Reduce the bag limit, and then it won't matter what guns are used! But,—DON'T touch autoloading guns! Don't hamper Inventive Genius!"

Is it not high time for American sportsmen to cease taking their moral principles and their codes of ethics from the gun-makers?

Here is a question that I would like to put before every hunter of game in America:

In view of the alarming scarcity of game, in view of the impending extermination of species by legal hunting, can any high-minded sportsman, can any good citizen either sell a machine shot-gun or use one in hunting?

A gentleman is incapable of taking an unfair advantage of any wild creature; therefore a gentleman cannot use punt guns for ducks, dynamite for game fish, or automatic or pump guns in bird-shooting. The machine guns and "silencers" are grossly unfair, and like gang-hooks, nets and dynamite for trout and bass, their use in hunting must everywhere be prohibited by law. Times have changed, and the lines for protection must be more tightly drawn.



The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania (Judge Orlady) has decided that the Pennsylvania law against the use of automatic guns in hunting is entirely constitutional, because every state has a right to say how its game may and may not be killed.

It is up to the American People to say now whether their wild life shall be slaughtered by machinery, or not.

If they are willing that it should be, then let us be consistent and say—away with all "conservation!" The game conservators can endure a gameless and birdless continent quite as well as the average citizen can.

HOW THEY WORK.—There are a few apologists for the automatic and pump guns who cheerfully say, "So long as the bag limit is observed what difference does it make how the birds are killed?"

It is strange that a conscientious man should ask such a question, when the answer is apparent.

We reply, "The difference is that an automatic or pump gun will kill fully twice as many waterfowl as a double-barrel, if not more; and it is highly undesirable that every gunner should get the bag limit of birds, or any number near it! The birds can not stand it. Moreover, the best states for ducks and geese have no bag limits on those birds!" To-day, on Currituck Sound, for example, the market hunters are killing all the waterfowl they can sell. On Marsh Island, Louisiana, one man has killed 369 ducks in one day, and another market gunner killed 430 in one day.

The automatic and the "pump" shot-guns are the favorite weapons of the game-hog who makes a specialty of geese and ducks. It is no uncommon thing for a gunner who shoots a machine gun to get, with one gun, as high as eight birds out of one flock. A man who has himself done this has told me so.

The Champion Game-Slaughter Case.—Here is a story from California that is no fairy tale. It was published, most innocently, in a western magazine, with the illustration that appears herewith, and in which please notice the automatic shot-gun:

"February 5th, I and a friend were at one of the Glenn County Club's camps.... Neither of us having ever had the pleasure of shooting over live decoys, we were anxious, and could hardly wait for the sport to commence. On arriving at the scene we noticed holes which had been dug in the ground, just large enough for a man to crawl into. These holes were used for hiding places, and were deep enough so the sportsmen would be entirely out of sight of the game. The birds are so wild that to move a finger will frighten them....

"The decoys are wild geese which had been crippled and tamed for this purpose. They are placed inside of silk net fences which are located on each side of the holes dug for hiding places. These nets are the color of the ground and it is impossible for the wild geese flying overhead to detect the difference.

"After we had investigated everything the expert caller and owner of the outfit exclaimed: 'Into your holes!'

"We noticed in the distance a flock of geese coming. Our caller in a few seconds had their attention, and they headed towards our decoys. Soon they were directly over us, but out of easy range of our guns. We were anxious to shoot, but in obedience to our boss had to keep still, and soon noticed that the birds were soaring around and in a short time were within fifteen or twenty feet of us. At that moment we heard the command, 'Punch 'em!' and the bombardment that followed was beyond imagining. We had fired five shots apiece and found we had bagged ten geese from this one flock.

"At the end of one hour's shooting we had 218 birds to our credit and were out of ammunition.

"On finding that no more shells were in our pits we took our dead geese to the camp and returned with a new supply of ammunition. We remained in the pits during the entire day. When the sun had gone behind the mountains we summed up our kill and it amounted to 450 geese!

"The picture shown with this article gives a view of the first hour's shoot. A photograph would have been taken of the remainder of the shoot, but it being warm weather the birds had to be shipped at once in order to keep them from spoiling.



"Supper was then eaten, after which we were driven back to Willows; both agreeing that it was one of the greatest days of sport we ever had, and wishing that we might, through the courtesy of the Glenn County Goose Club, have another such day. C.H.B."

Another picture was published in a Canadian magazine, illustrating a story from which I quote:

"I fixed the decoys, hid my boat and took my position in the blind. My man started his work with a will and hustled the ducks out of every cove, inlet or piece of marsh for two miles around. I had barely time to slip the cartridges into my guns—one a double and the other a five shot automatic—when I saw a brace of birds coming toward me. They sailed in over my decoys. I rose to the occasion, and the leader up-ended and tumbled in among the decoys. The other bird, unable to stop quick enough, came directly over me. He closed his wings and struck the ground in the rear of the blind.

"More and more followed. Sometimes they came singly, and then in twos and threes. I kept busy and attended to each bird as quickly as possible. Whenever there was a lull in the flight I went out in the boat and picked up the dead, leaving the wounded to take chances with any gunner lucky enough to catch them in open and smooth water. A bird handy in the air is worth two wounded ones in the water. Twice I took six dead birds out of the water for seven shots, and both guns empty.

"The ball thus opened, the birds commenced to move in all directions. Until the morning's flight was over I was kept busy pumping lead, first with the 10, then with the automatic, reloading, picking up the dead, etc."

And the reader will observe that the harmless, innocent, inoffensive automatic shot gun, that "don't matter if you enforce the bag limit," figures prominently in both stories and both photographs.

A Story of Two Pump Guns and Geese:—It comes from Aberdeen, S.D. (Sand Lake), in the spring of 1911. Mr. J.J. Humphrey tells it, in Outdoor Life magazine for July, 1911.

"Smith and I were about a hundred yards from them [the flock of Canada geese], when Murphy scared them. They rose in a dense mass and came directly between Smith and me. We were about gunshot distance apart, and they were not over thirty feet in the air when we opened up on them with our pump guns and No. 5 shot. When the smoke cleared away and we had rounded up the cripples we found we had twenty-one geese. I have heard of bigger killings out in this country, but never positively knew of them."

So then: those two gunners averaged 10-1/2 wild geese per pump gun out of one flock! And yet there are wise and reflective sportsmen who say, "What difference does the kind of gun make so long as you live up to the law?"

I think that the pump and automatic guns make about 75 per-cent of difference, against the game; that is all!

The number of shot-guns now in use in the United States is almost beyond belief. About six years ago a gentleman interested in the manufacture of such weapons informed me, and his statement has never been disputed, that every year about 500,000 new shot-guns were sold in the United States. The number of shot cartridges annually produced by our four great cartridge companies has been reliably estimated as follows:

Winchester Arms Co 300,000,000 Union Metallic Cartridge Co 250,000,000 Peters Cartridge Co 150,000,000 Western Cartridge Co 75,000,000 —————- 775,000,000

We must stop all the holes in the barrel, or eventually lose all the water. No group of bird-slaughterers is entitled to immunity. We will not "limit the bag, and enforce the laws," while we permit the makers and users of autoloading and pump guns to kill at will, as they demand.

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141 Broadway.

Feb. 26th 1906.

My dear Mr. Hornaday:—

It is with much surprise that I learn through your communication of even date that certain persons are claiming that the National Association of Audubon Societies for the Protection of Wild Animals and Birds is in favor of the use of automatic or pump guns, and consequently is not in favor of the passage of laws to prevent the use or sale of such firearms.

I beg officially to state that the National Association of Audubon Societies is absolutely opposed to either the manufacture, sale, or use of such firearms, and therefore hopes that the meritorious bill introduced by the New York Zoological Society will become a law.

I beg further to add that any statement contrary to the above in effect is unauthorized.

This society is working for the preservation of the wild birds and game of North America, and it sincerely should not stultify itself by advocating the use of one of the most potent means of destruction that has ever been devised.

You are at liberty to use this communication either publicly or privately.

Very sincerely yours, [Signature: William Dutcher] President.

A LETTER THAT TELLS ITS OWN STORY]

* * * * *

Yes; we will "limit the bag" and "enforce the laws;" but the machine guns and the alien shooters shall be eliminated at the same time! Each state has the power to regulate, absolutely, down to the smallest detail, the manner in which the game of The People shall be taken or not taken; and such laws are absolutely constitutional. If we can legislate punt guns and dynamite out of use, the machine guns and silencers can be treated similarly.

No immunity for wild-life exterminators.

The following unprejudiced testimony from a New York business man who is a sportsman, with a fine game preserve of his own, should be of general interest. It was written to G.O. Shields, March 21, 1906.

DEAR SIR:

Regarding the use of the automatic shot-gun, would say that I am a member of two southern ducking clubs where these guns are used very extensively. I have seen a flock of ducks come into a blind where one, two, or even three of these guns were in use, and have seen as many as eleven shots poured into a single flock.

We have considerable poaching on one of these clubs, the territory being so extensive that it is impossible to prevent it. We own 60,000 acres, and these poachers, I am told, nearly all use the automatic guns. They frequently kill six or eight ducks out of one flock—first taking a raking shot on the water, and then getting in the balance of the magazine before the flock is out of range. In fact, some of them carry two guns, and are able to discharge a part of the second magazine into the same flock.

As I told you the other evening, I am not so much against the gun when in the hands of gentlemen and real sportsmen, but, on account of its terrible possibilities for market hunters, I believe that the only safe way is to abolish it entirely, and that the better class should be willing to give up this weapon as being the only means of putting a stop to this willful game slaughter.

Very truly yours,

ARTHUR ROBINSON.

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HOW GENTLEMEN SPORTSMEN REGARD AUTOMATIC AND PUMP GUNS

Each one of the following organizations, chiefly clubs of gentlemen sportsmen, have adopted strong resolutions condemning the use of automatic guns in hunting, and either requesting or recommending the enactment of laws against their use:

New York Zoological Society ... Henry Fairfield Osborn, President The Camp-Fire Club of America ... Daniel C. Beard, President Boone and Crockett Club ... W. Austin Wadsworth, President New York State Fish, Game and Forest League ... 81 Clubs and Associations New York Association for the Protection of Fish and Game ... Alfred Wagstaff, President Lewis and Clark Club ... John M. Phillips, President League of American Sportsmen ... G.O. Shields, President Wild Life Protective Association ... W.T. Hornaday, President