posite, which produce an abundance of minute
seeds, many of which are easily scattered by the wind, are yet rare
species that never spread beyond a very limited area.

The above-mentioned passenger-pigeon affords such an excellent example
of an enormous bird-population kept up by a comparatively slow rate of
increase, and in spite of its complete helplessness and the great
destruction which it suffers from its numerous enemies, that the
following account of one of its breeding-places and migrations by the
celebrated American naturalist, Alexander Wilson, will be read with
interest:--

"Not far from Shelbyville, in the State of Kentucky, about five years
ago, there was one of these breeding-places, which stretched through the
woods in nearly a north and south direction, was several miles in
breadth, and was said to be upwards of 40 miles in extent. In this tract
almost every tree was furnished with nests wherever the branches could
accommodate them. The pigeons made their first appearance there about
the 10th of April, and left it altogether with their young before the
25th of May. As soon as the young were fully grown and before they left
the nests, numerous parties of the inhabitants from all parts of the
adjacent country came with waggons, axes, beds, cooking utensils, many
of them accompanied by the greater part of their families, and encamped
for several days at this immense nursery. Several of them informed me
that the noise was so great as to terrify their horses, and that it was
difficult for one person to hear another without bawling in his ear. The
ground was strewed with broken limbs of trees, eggs, and young squab
pigeons, which had been precipitated from above, and on which herds of
hogs were fattening. Hawks, buzzards, and eagles were sailing about in
great numbers, and seizing the squabs from the nests at pleasure; while,
from 20 feet upwards to the top of the trees, the view through the woods
presented a perpetual tumult of crowding and fluttering multitudes of
pigeons, their wings roaring like thunder, mingled with the frequent
crash of falling timber; for now the axemen were at work cutting down
those trees that seemed most crowded with nests, and contrived to fell
them in such a manner, that in their descent they might bring down
several others; by which means the falling of one large tree sometimes
produced 200 squabs little inferior in size to the old birds, and almost
one heap of fat. On some singl