Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 44729-h.htm or 44729-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44729/44729-h/44729-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44729/44729-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/passengerpigeon00mers Transcriber's note: Whole and fractional parts of numbers are displayed as 6-1/4. Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). THE PASSENGER PIGEON [Illustration: PASSENGER PIGEON (_Columba Migratoria_) Upper bird, male; lower, female] THE PASSENGER PIGEON by W. B. MERSHON [Illustration: Publisher's Logo] New York The Outing Publishing Company 1907 Copyright, 1907, by W B Mershon The Outing Press Deposit, N. Y. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Introduction ix I My Boyhood Among the Pigeons 1 II The Passenger Pigeon 9 _From "American Ornithology," by Alexander Wilson_ III The Passenger Pigeon 25 _From "Ornithological Biography," by John James Audubon_ IV As James Fenimore Cooper Saw It 41 V The Wild Pigeon of North America 48 _By Chief Pokagon, in "The Chautauquan"_ VI The Passenger Pigeon 60 _From "Life Histories of North American Birds," by Charles Bendire_ VII Netting the Pigeons 74 _By William Brewster, in "The Auk"_ VIII Efforts to Check the Slaughter 77 _By Prof. H. B. Roney_ IX The Pigeon Butcher's Defense 93 _By E. T. Martin, in "American Field"_ X Notes of a Vanished Industry 105 XI Recollections of "Old Timers" 119 XII The Last of the Pigeons 141 XIII What Became of the Wild Pigeon? 163 _By Sullivan Cook, in "Forest and Stream"_ XIV A Novel Theory of Extinction 173 _By C. H. Ames and Robert Ridgway_ XV News from John Burroughs 179 XVI The Pigeon in Manitoba 186 _By George E. Atkinson_ XVII The Passenger Pigeon in Confinement 200 _By Ruthven Deane, in "The Auk"_