"On my way to Frankfort," says the latter writer, "when about one o'clock, the Pigeons which I had observed the greater part of the morning flying northerly began to return in such immense numbers as I had never before witnessed. Coming to an opening by the side of a creek called the Benson, where I had a more uninterrupted view, I was astonished at their appearance. They were flying with great steadiness and rapidity at a height beyond gunshot, in several strata deep, and so close together that could shot have reached them one discharge could not have failed of bringing down several individuals. From right to left, as far as the eye could reach, the breadth of this vast procession extended, seeming everywhere equally crowded. Curious to determine how long this appearance would continue, I took my watch out to note the time, and sat down to observe them. It was then half-past one. I sat for more than an hour, but instead of any diminution of this prodigious procession, it seemed to increase in numbers and rapidity, and, anxious to reach Frankfort before night, I rose and went on. About four o'clock in the afternoon I crossed the Kentucky River, at the town of Frankfort, at which time the living torrent above my head seemed as numerous and as extensive as ever. Long after this I observed them in large bodies, that continued to pass for six or eight minutes, and these again were followed by other detached bodies, all moving in the same direction, till after six in the evening. The great breadth of front which this mighty multitude preserved would seem to intimate a corresponding breadth of their breeding-place." "In the autumn of 1813," relates Audubon, "I left my house at Henderson, on the banks of the Ohio, on my way to Louisville. In passing over the Barrens, a few miles beyond Hardensburg, I observed the Pigeons flying from north-east to south-west in greater numbers than I had ever seen them before, and feeling an inclination to count the flocks that might pass within reach of my eye in one hour, I dismounted, seated myself on an eminence, and began to mark with my pencil, making a dot for every flock that passed. In a short time, finding the task that I had undertaken impracticable, as the birds poured on in countless multitudes, I rose, and counting the dots that had been put down, found that one hundred and sixty-three had been made in twenty-one minutes. I travelled on, and still met more the farther I proceeded. The air was literally filled with Pigeons; the light of noon-day was obscured as by an eclipse; the dung fell in spots, not unlike melting flakes of snow, and the continued buzz of wings had a tendency to lull my senses to repose.