Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1900-01-01

mandS each year the Sacrlnce OF lUU,-
| 00O, 900 birds to furnish ornaments for
headgear.
It is civilized women, too, not saw
ages, who deck themselves with these
trophies of cruelty. Each year feath-
ers become more and more feature
of millinery. This season the fashion
is at it's height.
Feminine vanity demands the whole
sale slaughter of birds of every kind.
No hat is correct that has not de-
spoiled, some of the feathered tribes
for it's adjoining. Whole birds and
heads of birds, breasts, wings, aigret-
| ties, feathers, quilts are seen on almost
every fair Womans head.
In the neighborhood of Broadway
and Twenty-third street New York
World reporter took snapshots of some
of the hats that passed. He secured
pictures-of three hats with whole
paroquets, two hats with owls heads,
one cluster of humming birds, one hat
trimmed with the wings OF nine hum
ming birds, five bird of paradise
plumes, one red bird, the wings of six
blue birds, a robin red breast, six
starlings, two hooking birds, four
doves, the wings of a gold-fnch, seven
blackbirds and sixteen sea gulls, be-
sides the wings and breasts of many
birds of unknown species.
AS fashions change the demand for
birds varies. Seagulls are the latest
millinery favorites and form the trim
ming of the popular walking hats. The
whole bird is worn bodily, either in
front or at one side. This fashion has
seriously alarmed ornithologists, for
these birds are our coast defenders.
They constitute a winged Board Of
Health and clean the waters Of decay
ing matter These sea scavengers are
the friends of coast jewellers, and wher-
ever they are exterminated sickness in
creases.
Even the albatross, the bird of whcih
the Ancient Mariner says:
And I had done hellish thing,
And it would work 'em woe,
For all averred I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow,
does not escape. Entire hats are now
seen made Of albatrOss feathers.
The extent to which the slaughter
of birds is carried in the United States
is astonishing. A factory at Wantagh,
L. l., owned by William L. Wilson,
where the skins and plumage of birds
are prepared for millinery purposes,
was recently destroyed by fire. There
were burned in the factory 10000 sea-
guIls, 10000 wings of other birds and
10000 heads of birds representing
many varieties.
This establishment had men at Cape
Cod, the islands on the Maine coast
and along the shores of Virginia,
Georgia and Florida busy filling orders
for birds.
A number of cunning parties have
already been sent out from the factory
for this winter. One party went out
in sloop to hunt nothing but water
fowls, another went south with a
naphtha launch to explore southern
rivers for birds and another went to
search the Florida coast. One hunter
killed 400 nesting birds in four days
and another shot 14,100 in Florida in
one season.
I In every quarter of the globe
fashions bird tax has been levied
Even the turkey buzzard contributes
his quota. It is true law in this
country prohibits the killing of these
scavangers, but since their quilts have
become popular ornaments they are
trapped and the quilts pulled out, after
which they are turned loose to starve.
Women, who are said to be respons-
i've to others woes, do not betray that
quality when it comes to millinery.
There is no trimming for hats more
popular than fluffy aigrettes. These
aigrette plumes constitute the we'd
ding dress of the male and female
heron. Only during the honeymoon
are they worn.
Then these sociable birds gather in
companies. There are usually several
hundred in a rookery. The plume
hunter has only to wait The birds
out hunting food for their young soon
return. One by one as they come they
stop to rest on the lookout perch.
There is the sharp crack of a rife.
The bird falls. Instinct brings every
| bird back to the trees where their
young birds starve.
So complete has been this heron
slaughter that these birds are now
practically exterminated in Florida,
and the plume-hunters have had to go
to South America. A Florida hunter
once boosted that he had killed 800 in
an afternoon.
Birds of paradise are also disappear
ing. They, too put on their beautiful
plumes during the nesting season,
when they gather in droves and have
their dances in the trees. 1t is then
that they must be shot in order to get
| their nuptial ornaments.
This work pays we'll. Aigrettes are
worth their weight in gold. Spoonbills,
ibises, breeding plovers, sandpipers,
terms, boat-tailed blackbirds, gray
ring-birds, owls and hawks bring from
10 cents to 81 a carcess and from 20
11y