AVERY BIRD COLLECTION 43 
of a barnyard cock. Under a different state of affairs 
these four hens and four cocks might have bred me a 
large flock of turkeys. 
“It was just after our civil war, reconstruction of the 
states was undergoing its accomplishment, and the freed- 
man, armed with his sham-dam skelp, was ubiquitous; 
and my turkeys, as well as every other species of game 
or vermin, were objects of his pursuit. Squirrels were 
almost exterminated, except in the river bottoms. The 
mocking-bird, even, did not escape this promiscuous 
slaughter. I saw one day, on my place, two negro boys, 
about eighteen years old; they both had guns, and when 
interrogated as to the species of game their bags contain- 
ed, they made some evasive answer. I thrust my hand 
into the sack and drew out four mocking-birds. Indigna- 
tion seized me, and the reader may imagine that I used 
some very strong language at this ruthless destruction 
of a bird that the worst white boy in the South would 
hestitate to kill. 
“My turkeys being very gentle, as I said, and daily at- 
tention and feeding from the hand preventing shyness, 
or any disposition to wander far from home in the breed- 
ing season, the hens laid in the yard. Sambo and his 
sister discovered the nests, and the eggs were stolen. 
Thwarted thus at first, the four hens wandered far from 
the house to find a safe retreat for their nests. One flew 
at least a half a mile every morning before she alighted, 
and fed along toward her nest, about two miles distant. 
She returned home to roost late in the evening; but after 
she went to sitting I did not see her again. She reared a 
brood, as I afterward learned from a neighbor, who saw, 
with her, in his field, a young wild turkey nearly grown, 
and as the field lay in the direction taken by my hen, I 
inferred that it must be my lost turkey and her brood. 
One of the other three hens brought home five nearly 
grown turkeys; but where she nested or how she escaped 
being killed, I knew not; I did know, however, that she 
was stolen from the yard fence where she roosted with 
her family. Silly bird! If she had known Sambo’s thiev- 
ish propensities as well as I knew them, she would have 
