TURKEY SHOOTING 427 
who came to our camp that on the mountain north of 
us I could find a large drove of wild turkeys. 
“The mountains in that section are very rugged, and 
heavily timbered, but the woods are rather open, the 
undergrowth being sparse and small. The timber is 
white, black and post oak, hickory, beech, walnut, 
cherry, and a half dozen other kinds, and such timber! 
Walnut six feet in diameter, and white oak the same. 
In fact, nowhere in the South does such a wealth of 
timber exist. 
“One bright afternoon, taking my shotgun, I climbed 
the steep mountain for about one mile, to where a 
beautiful spring bursts from the rocks. I stopped, 
and was enjoying the solitude of the gloomy, grand 
old forest, when I espied a yellowhammer on a small 
tree, and shot him. This disturbed two gray squirrels, 
that ran to the top of a large wild cherry tree, but two 
loads of No. 6 put them in my game bag. 
“I then started north along a path, but I had only 
gone a short distance when I walked out of the path 
to look down into a grove of post oaks, when I beheld 
a sight that put my. heart to beating like a trip-hammer. 
Twenty-six as fine turkeys as I ever saw, not two hun- 
dred yards distant, were feeding as though nothing 
could harm them, and paying no attention to the noise 
I had made killing the bird and squirrels. Armed only 
with a shotgun and some No. 2 shot cartridges, I began 
the task of getting in reach of those turkeys. 
“Down on my knees and hands I went, and after 
forty minutes of hard work I was within seventy-five 
