The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-03-11
BIRDS FOR woMEN,s HATS.
Widespread Slaughter Made Possible
by the Dictates of Fashion.


Henry C. Mercer in City and State.
When the hairdresser is done while the
carriage waits before your last look in
the mirror, read If you can another des-
cription by T. Gilbert Pearson (''World's
Congress of ornithology') of the, starvel-
Ing cries dedicated to you at an inland
rookery near Waldo, Fla, where the flies
buzzed over heaps of mangled and beauti-
full bodies. each with back stripped raw
Read now the plumes of one parent hidden
under tuft Of grass had failed to find
their roundabout way to the dinner
dance"
THE ground was still wet with it's
blood. The earth had been beaten smooth
with its wings. The neck was arched. The
plumes on Its head were raised and its bill
was buried in the blood-clotted feathers
of It's breast. Though 1t was dead, It's
young were alive. Too weak 10 rise they
uttered the piteous cries, 80 often describ-
ed, as they lifted their heads for the food
which because of the vanity of human
mothers their dead mothers could never
bring"
There is nothing In the whole earth. I"
says Mr.. w. H. Hudson, lin the London
Times for Oct H. 1897 80 pitiable as
this. So pitiable and shameful that for
such a purpose human cunning should
take advantage of that feeling and instinct
which we regard as 50 noble in our own
species, and as something SO sacred, the
tender passion OF a parent for It's Offspring
which causes Il to neglect it's own safety
and perish miserably, a sacrifice 10 its
love"
But who does not know that the sick
ening work is not confined to herons?
While ten years ago Mr.. Scott was see
ing these things in Florida New York
woman (see Science Feb. 26 1856 hired
men I'm one season to kill, at 10 cents each,
about 1000 gulls and terms on the Cobbs
Island roost In the Chesapeake bay These
were sold in Paris-where, according to
Guizot all civilizing ideas must first be
tested by a superior intelligence before
their application to Chrlstendon--at 40
cents each. Are you capable OF teaching
a child not to be cruel IL you viii not dis
card your "murderous millinery" when
you know that--as explained In Science.
Feb. %. 1Ss6-thousands OF skins Of the
soft-feathered and easily dyed grebes,
rare In the east come TO you In bales
from deserted nest grounds IN the west?
That. according 10 the editor OF Forest
and Stream-March 6. 18S4-a bird man
who handles 10000 skins per annum killed
and prepared for you 1l.01S children of the
air In three months In 1888 in Eastern
South Carolina2
Who cares whether these birds or those
Of the 10000 skins shipped TO a New York
dealer about the same time were songsters
or not? Who cares whether they were
shot In season or out of season, provided
their bodies or feathers are "pretty?"
What effect has been produced by the
knowledge that Isaac McClellen OF Green
port l.. l.. In 1885. told Mr.. william
butcher Science Feb. 26. 1880 that our
sisters agents, the hat decorators. had
nearly exterminated the gulls in that re-
gion, slaughtering besides. robbins, ori-
oles. blackbirds meadow larks. etc.7 And
who regrets the thousands OF cedar birds
which one gunner told Mr.. butcher he
shot for women's hats In the winter of
1883. or the fact that the pleasure boat
men at Barnaget and Beach Haven, N. j.,
stopped boating 10 earn $50 a week kill
ing terms for women at 10 cents apiece
together with crow blackbirds, red-wing-
ed blackblrds and -buntings, so as
10 make II possible for Mr.. butcher TO
find 5000 skins OF these birds for sale IN
q New York hat store In 1888?
But why care for the 1000 terms (see J.