Young men who are now hunting for something to shoot and wondering what has become of our game, must hear with anger and regret such reports as this from western Michigan in the days gone by: "In three years' time there were caught and shipped to New York and other eastern cities 990,000 dozen pigeons, and in the two succeeding years it was estimated by the same men who caught the pigeons at Hartford that there were one-third more shipped from Shelby than from Hartford; and from Petoskey, Emmett County, two years later, it is now claimed by C. H. Engle, a resident of this town, who was a participant in this ungodly slaughter, that there were shipped five carloads a day for thirty days, with an average of 8,250 dozen to the carload. Now, when one asks you what has become of the wild pigeons, refer them to C. H. Engle, Stephen Stowe, Chas. Sherburne, and Hiram Corwin, and a man by the name of Miles from Wisconsin, Mr. Miles having caught 500 dozen in a single day. And when you are asked what has become of the wild pigeons, figure up the shipping bills, and they will show what has become of this, the grandest game bird that ever cleft the air of any continent."
My young friends, I want to humbly ask your forgiveness for having taken a small part in the destruction of this, the most exciting of sport. And there is not one of us but is ashamed of the slaughter which has robbed you of enjoyment. If we had been restrained by laws of humanity, you, too, could have enjoyed this sport for years to come.
A Novel Theory of Extinction
By C. H. Ames and Robert Ridgway
Boston, March 8, 1906.
Mr. W. B. Mershon:
Dear Sir:—Thank you for your note of the third in reply to mine of the first, in regard to your book on the Passenger Pigeon. I note that you say: