St. Landry democrat., 1885-02-14
BIRDS THAT GO ON HATS.
An Explanation OF Some of the Mysterious
Creations That Are Seen.

An Explanation OF Some of the Mysterious
Creations That Are Seen.
A great heap of widespread antlers
in the window, with simple black-and-
white sign above them which reads
stTaxidermist' is the only street display
of downtown place of business where
hundreds of thousands of birds have
been fiayed and their skins dressed for
the ornamenting Of hats and bonnets,
and hundreds of hides of all sorts of
animals, from a mouse to a cinnamon
bear or an African tiger, have been
mounted for the use of dealers in furs
and the decoration of parlors and
studies. The chief part of the business
is the preparation of birds for MILF
ners A pretty black-eyed girl behind
the counter in the front room said that
the business was not very brisk in the
winter, but with the coming of the birds
in spring it would become very lively.
What kind of birds do you use
most?"
THE common sorts = red-winged
blackbirds, reed birds, snipes, turtle
doves, orioles, yellow birds, thrushes.
ANY small bird can be used
''How do you get them?"
eve buy them of men who make q
business of supplying us. Most of the
birds we handle are from New Jersey,
but good many come from Long
Island and we receive some from the
West and South. A few are imported. "
''What do you pay for them?n
''That depends on the fashions en-
tirely. Two years ago the demand of
the milliners was for red wings and yell
low birds We paid from twenty-five
to thirty-fve cents apiece, and at one
time we had to pay as high as forty
seven cents apiece for a lot. Last year
we got all we wanted at from seven to
eight cents each. When the hunters
have to supply q brisk demand they
can get more, of course, because the
supply of birds of each variety does
not vary greatly from year to year"
''Do the hunters shoot the birds?"
81 guess not. / do not find any shot
in fiaying those bought from regular
customers
How dc they catch them then9n
II guess you could not get them to
tell you. There is one man who brings
us from fifteen hundred to two thousand
a week during the warm months. He
says he has partner and no other
help. He lives in Red Bank. One
would think the woods would be depop-
ulated, or else that he would get rich
enough to retire, but he has been work
ing away for years now. f"
''Where do all these fancy birds that
look like pictures of tropical rarities
come from?''
'.All from Jersey. By inserting a
snipe's bill in the place of the bill Of a
crow bIackbird, and then combining
parts Of the skins of other common
birds, we produce a monstrosity, but il
the colors are well matched the result
is attractive to the common eye, how
ever grotesque it may appear to one
who knows all about the appearance OF
birds. 1t Is not uncommon to see in
the Grand street windows hats that
have half dozen bird heads projecting
from one mass of feathers that might be
the breast of swan or the pickings
from a secondhand pillow. The wings
that adorn some hats are about as much
like wings as stove-pipe is like a lead
pencil. But these queer tastes are the
making of our business. The portions
of the birds skin which are cut away
when mounting a bird naturally for a
hat. can all be used up in wings by
gluing them on a model. / read the
other day about an Ohio young woman
whose. nerves were wholly shattered in
millinery store because, as the article
said, of her sympathy with the poor
little birds she had to handle. / guess
there was some error about that. ]
think the shock must have come from
contemplation of some of our COM
bination birds. She has my sympathy. :
N Y San.
Russian Justice.