Most of those which rest on the islands in this neighbourhood quit the mainland between Clump Point and Tam o’ Shanter, the trend of numbers being toward the latter point.  Six miles separate these headlands, but the channel between Tam o’ Shanter and Dunk Island is little more than 2 1/2 miles, so that the pigeons here become concentrated to a certain extent.  Early in the season they pass Dunk Island at the rate of about 300 per minute, during the hour and a half preceding sunset.  To speak more definitely, but well within the mark, those flying south, easily within range of sight from the sand spit here, may be calculated at something like 27,000.  But in reality the procession of birds may cover a breadth of 2 miles, while only those flocks nearest to the observer are included in the estimate.  No doubt, fully 100,000 come and go evening and morning.  When the incubating season is at its height the number lessens; when all the young are hatched the unmarshalled procession trails along with but brief intervals between the companies—­some flying low over the water, others high and wide.

Great as the company of birds seems, it is small compared with the myriads that favoured the islands in years gone by.  Pioneers tell of the days when blacks were wont to make regular expeditions, returning to the mainland with canoes ladened with fledglings and eggs, which in accordance with tradition were devoured by the older men and women.  The youngsters of the tribes were nurtured in the belief that if they partook of such luxuries all the pigeons would fly away never to re-visit their haunts.  Strange as it may seem, the vast quantities eaten by the blacks did not seem to decrease the numbers.  But since the advent of the white man, with his nerve-shattering gun, a remarkable diminution has been observed in some localities.  No doubt it could be successfully maintained that the gun is responsible for an insignificant toll compared with that taken by the blacks of the past.  But the birds were then deprived of their nestlings and eggs quietly, if remorselessly, while the noise of the gun is more demoralising to the species as a whole than the numbers actually killed.

Nutmeg pigeons are frequently shot by the hundred as they reach their nesting-place and mass themselves on the trees.  Some of their nurseries lie far away from the usual tracks of the sportsman.  Yet a single expedition during the breeding season to one of the islands may cause immense destruction and unprofitable loss of life.  Though in lessening numbers they venture much further along the coast to the south, they keep well within the tropical zone.  The most favoured resorts within many miles are the Barnard Islands, 14 miles to the north of Dunk Island.  The whole of the tribes, therefore, though scattered for feeding over an immense area of the coast congregate on four or five islands—­miles apart—­to rest and breed.  The assemblages are indeed prodigious; but they represent the gathering together of clans