(Beebe). "Hesperornis--a wingless, toothed, diving bird,
about 5 feet in length, which inhabited the great seas during the
Cretaceous period, some four millions of years ago." (Legend under
colored frontispiece.)
_Life Histories of North American Diving Birds_ (Bent), pages 47-60.
_Bird Book_ (Eckstorm), pages 9-13.
_By-Ways and Bird-Notes_ (Thompson), pages 170-71. "The cretaceous birds
of America all appear to be aquatic, and comprise some eight or a dozen
genera, and many species. Professor Marsh and others have found in
Kansas a large number of most interesting fossil birds, one of them, a
gigantic loon-like creature, six feet in length from beak to toe, taken
from the yellow chalk of the Smoky Hill River region and from calcareous
shale near Fort Wallace, is named _Hesperornis regalis_."
_Educational Leaflet No. 78._ (National Association of Audubon
Societies.)
If twenty years of undisputed possession seems long enough to give a man
a legal title to "his" land, surely birds have a claim too ancient to be
ignored by modern beings. Are we not in honor bound to share what we
have so recently considered "ours," with the creatures that inherited
the earth before the coming of their worst enemy, Civilization? And in
so far as lies within our power, shall we not protect the free, wild
feathered folk from ourselves?
EVE AND PETRO
_Petrochelidon lunifrons_, Cliff-Swallow, Eave-Swallow.
_Bird Studies with a Camera_ (Chapman), pages 89-105; "Where Swallows
Roost."
_Handbook of Nature-Study_ (Comstock), pages 112-113.
_Bird Migration_ (Cooke), pages 5, 9, 19-20, 26, 27; Fig. 6.
_Our Greatest Travelers_ (Cooke), page 349; "Migration Route of the
Cliff Swallows."
_Bird Book_ (Eckstorm), pages 201-12.
_Bird-Lore_, vol. 21, page 175; "Helping Barn and Cliff Swallows to
Nest."
UNCLE SAM
_Haliaeetus leucocephalus_, the Bald Eagle.
_Stories of Bird Life_ (Pearson), pages 71-80; "A Pair of Eagles."
_The Fall of the Year_ (Sharp), chapter V.
_Educational Leaflet No. 82._ (National Association of Audubon
Societies.)
At the time this story goes to press, our national emblem is threatened
with extermination. The following references indicate the situation in
1920:--
_Conservationist, The,_ vol. 3, pages 60-61; "Our National Emblem."
_National Geographic Magazine,_ vol. 38, page 466.
_Natural History,_ vol. 20, pages 259 and 334; "The Dead Eagles of
Alaska now number 8356."
_Scienc
|