winter,--and then the survivors deserted the roost."

[Illustration: NORTHERN ROBINS READY FOR SOUTHERN SLAUGHTER
195 Birds at Avery Island, La. in January 1912, Photographed Daring the
Annual Slaughter, by E.A. McIlhenny]

No: these people were not Apache Indians, led by a Geronimo who knew no
mercy, no compassion. We imagine that they were mostly poor white trash,
of Tennessee. One small hamlet sent to market annually enough dead
robins to return $500 at _five cents per dozen_; which means _120,000
birds_!

Last winter Mr. Edward A. McIlhenny of Avery Island, La. (south of New
Iberia) informed me that every winter, during the two weeks that the
holly berries are ripe thousands of robins come to his vicinity to feed
upon them. "Then every negro man and boy who can raise a gun is after
them. About 10,000 robins are slaughtered each day while they remain.
Their dead bodies are sold in New Iberia at 10 cents each." The
accompanying illustrations taken by Mr. McIlhenny shows 195 robins on
one tree, and explains how such great slaughter is possible.

An officer of the Louisiana Audubon Society states that a conservative
estimate of the number of robins annually killed in Louisiana for food
purposes when they are usually plentiful, is a _quarter of a million_!

The food of the robin is as follows:

Insects, 40 per cent; wild fruit, 43 per cent; cultivated fruit, 8 per
cent, miscellaneous vegetable food, 5 per cent.