Page:The Migration of Birds - Thomas A Coward - 1912.pdf/130

106 seriously injured, falling helplessly into the sea.' On the following night when many fieldfares, redwings, thrushes and other birds were passing, he says—"Sometimes we use the terms hundreds and thousands without thinking what these figures mean but on this occasion when I say thousands were killed I do not exaggerate in the slightest"

Mr W. Brewster's account of his experiences at the Point Lepreaux lighthouse (8), shows that similar disasters occur in Canada and the States, as indeed they do Wherever there are passages of birds. On a foggy evening in September 1885 "as soon as the sky became overcast small birds began to come about the light—with the advent of the fog they multiplied tenfold in the course of a few minutes" and many struck. "About the top of the tower, a belt of light projected some thirty yards into the mist by the powerful reflectors; and in this belt swarms of birds, circling, floating, soaring, now advancing, next retreating, but never quite able, as it seemed, to throw off the spell of the fatal lantern. Dozens were continually leaving the throng" of birds which had flown to leeward, "and skimming towards the lantern. As they approached they usually soared upward, and those which started on a level with the platform usually passed above the roof.  Often for a minute or more not a bird would strike. Then, as if seized