The Slaughter of the Crested Heron.

Otago Witness, Issue 2579, 19 August 1903, Page 66

The Slaughter of the Crested Heron.

The League of Women for the Protection of Birds in Europe is now more active than ever in its campaign against the fashion of wearing plumage on hats. Berries and flowers are decorations all sufficient for the members.

This league is spreading with surprising rapidity. It was founded in 1899. It has branches now in England, France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Russia, ;ind Holland. The Geneva branch of the league has just issued an appeal to women asking them not to encourage the slaughter of birds for millinery purposes. The appeal says :

"One of the most fashionable ornaments ■of hats is a light and delicate plume called an aigrette or crest, taken from the white hero'i of North America. Some naturalists in the United States have made known, to the entire world the barbarous manner in which this ornament is obtained, and our appeal is, addressed to women in the hope that those -\vlio read it mpy cease to wear adornments which are obtained by such ciuel tortures.

"The aigrette is the nuptial ornament of the species of heron in question. It grows only during the mating or nest building season. Hunters all ovei the world spare the lives of birds during that season, but rapacious and pitiless fashion does not spare them. Bright feathers> must be procured at all costs.

"The poor herons gather together in flocks in the marshes. They build their nests in willows and other trees of the same nature, and while they are occupied in feeding their young birds, unable to fly, the dealers come* upon them.

"The massacre is easy ; the creatures are almost tame. They never ily far from their nests and they fall by hundreds, victims of the instinct which impels them

to protect their young.

"At the close of the slaughter the hunters go away happy" in the possession of the crests torn from the lieads of tlie unfortunate birds whose bleeding little bodies lie in h,eaps on the ground around the tree.. And the young herons, after having called their parents in vain, at last die of inanition.

"Let us hope that women may be horrorstricken at the thought that an abominable fashion threatens the total destruction of thp immense mass of charming little winged creatures which constitute the most brilliant and the most delightful adornment of nature in the two worlds.' 1