o seek for
every beech nut or acorn. The last ranks continually pass over and
alight in front, in such quick succession that the whole still has
the appearance of being on the wing. The quantity of ground thus
harvested (moissonee) is astonishing, and so clean is the work that
no gleaners think it worth while to follow where the pigeons have
been.

During the middle of the day, after the repast is finished, the
whole settle on the trees to enjoy rest, and digest the food; but,
as the sun sinks, the army departs in a body for the roosting place,
not unfrequently hundreds of miles off. This has been ascertained by
persons keeping account of the arrival at, and departure from the
curious roosting places, to which I must now conduct the reader.

To one of these general nightly rendezvous, not far from the banks
of the Green River, in Kentucky, I paid repeated visits. The place
chosen was in a portion of the forest where the trees were of great
height with little under-wood. I rode over the ground lengthwise
upwards of forty miles, and crossed it in different parts,
ascertaining its average width to be a little more than three miles.

My first view of this spot was about a fortnight after the birds had
chosen it. I arrived there nearly two hours before sunset. Few
pigeons were then to be seen, but a great number of persons with
horses and wagons, guns and ammunition, had already established
different camps on the borders.

Many trees two feet in diameter I observed were broken at no great
distance from the ground, and the branches of many of the largest
and tallest so much so that the desolation already exhibited
equalled that of a furious tornado. The sun was lost to our view,
yet not a pigeon had arrived. All on a sudden, I heard a general cry
of, "Here they come!"

The noise which they made, though distant, reminded me of a hard
gale at sea passing through the rigging of a close-reefed vessel. As
the birds arrived and passed over me, I felt a current of air that
surprised me. The stream of birds still kept increasing. Fires were
lighted, and many people had torches, and a most magnificent, as
well as wonderful and terrifying sight was before me.

The pigeons, coming in by millions, alighted every where, one on the
top of another, until masses of them, resembling hanging swarms of
bees as large as hogsheads were formed on every tree. These heavy
clusters were seen to give way as the supporting branches, breaking
d