GAME AND ITS PROTECTION. 19 
bring up the rear. From July, when the yellow- 
legs and dowitchers abound; throughout August, in 
which month the larger bay-birds are continuously 
streaming by; during September, when the English 
snipe are on the meadows and the wood-ducks in the 
lily-pad marshes of the fresh-water lakes; in Octo- 
ber, when the teal and blue-bills are abundant in the 
great west; all through the fall and into winter, 
when the geese and canvas-backs arrive, the bay- 
man finds his sport in perfection. 
Many of the upland birds are disappearing; the 
quail is being killed with merciless energy, and his 
loved haunts of dense brush are cleared away from 
year to year; the woodcock can hardly rest in peace 
long enough to rear her young, and finds many of 
her favorite secluded spots drained by the enterpris- 
ing farmer; the ruffed grouse disappears with the 
receding forest, and the prairie chicken with the 
cultivation of the open land. But although innu- 
merable ducks, snipe, and plovers are killed every 
season, and by unjustifiable measures are driven — 
from certain localities, their vast flights throughout 
the whole country—amounting to myriads in the 
west—are apparently as innumerable as ever. 
From the first of August to the last of December 
they stretch athwart the sky from the Atlantic to 
the Pacific; and although in localities they may 
appear scarce, still constitute countless hosts. Were 
it possible to stand on some peak of the Rocky 
Mountains, and take in at a glance the vast stretch 
of heavens from ocean to ocean, with the moving 
