No flying or crawling creature escapes their sharp little eyes. A great
Frenchman says that if it weren't for the birds human beings would
perish from the face of the earth. They are doing all this for us, and
how are we rewarding them? All over America they are hunted and killed.
Five million birds must be caught every year for American women to wear
in their hats and bonnets. Just think of it, girls, Isn't it dreadful?
Five million innocent, hardworking, beautiful birds killed, that
thoughtless girls and women may ornament themselves with their little
dead bodies. One million bobolinks have been killed in one month near
Philadelphia. Seventy song-birds were sent from one Long Island village
to New York milliners.
"In Florida, cruel men shoot the mother birds on their nests while they
are rearing their young, because their plumage is prettiest at that
time, The little ones cry pitifully, and starve to death. Every bird of
the rarer kinds that is killed, such as humming birds, orioles and
kingfishers, means the death of several others--that is, the young that
starve to death, the wounded that fly away to die, and those whose
plumage is so torn that it is not fit to put in a fine lady's bonnet.
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