we cannot comprehend; yet however
inscrutable to us, this spiritual world must be guided by its own
unerring laws, and the harmonious order which reigns in all we can see
and understand, ascending through the series of immortal and invisible
existence, must govern even the powers and dominions, the seraphim and
cherubim, that surround the throne of God himself.

[Footnote 64: Distinguished as a writer and scholar, and especially for
his work on the Botany of South Carolina and Georgia; a native of South
Carolina.]

* * * * *

=_John James Audubon, 1776-1851._= (Manual, p. 504.)

From the "Ornithological Biography."

=_258._= THE PASSENGER PIGEON.

I cannot describe to you the extreme beauty of their aerial evolutions,
when a hawk chanced to press upon the rear of a flock. At once, like a
torrent, and with a noise like thunder, they rushed into a compact mass,
pressing upon each other towards the centre. In these almost solid
masses, they darted forward in undulating and angular lines, descended
and swept close over the earth with inconceivable velocity, mounted
perpendicularly so as to resemble a vast column, and when high, were
seen wheeling and twisting within their continued lines, which then
resembled the coils of a gigantic serpent.

It is extremely interesting to see flock after flock performing exactly
the same evolutions which had been traced as it were, in the air, by a
preceding flock. Thus should a hawk have charged on a group at a certain
spot, the angles, curves, and undulations that have been described by
the birds, in their efforts to escape from the dreaded talons of the
plunderer, are undeviatingly followed by the next group that comes up.
Should the by-stander happen to witness one of these affrays, and,
struck with the rapidity and elegance of the motions exhibited, feel
desirous of seeing them repeated, his wishes will be gratified, if he
only remain in the place until the next group comes up.

As soon as the pigeons discover a sufficiency of food to entice them to
alight, they fly around in circles, reviewing the country below. During
their evolutions, on such occasions, the dense mass which they form,
exhibits a beautiful appearance, as it changes its direction, now
displaying a glistening sheet of azure, when the backs of the birds come
simultaneously into view, and anon, suddenly presenting a mass of rich
purple. They then pass lower, over the woods, and