178 



AMERICAK GAME BIRD SHOOTING. 



at that time. I have eaten their flesh without season- 

 ing, when hard pressed by hunger, but I must say that I 

 found it a very difficult matter to reconcile my palate to 

 its flavor, and that I was glad when the repast was 

 over, I did not know at that time how to prepare it, but 

 after learning the modus operandi, as previously de- 

 scribed, I found I could partake of it with a relish, which 

 varied in degree according to the sharpness of my appetite. 

 The Indians eat the eggs of this species even when 

 they contain chicks, and consider them quite palatable. 

 The eggs are rather large, and their ground-color varies 

 from greenish-drab to drab and buff. The sage cock is 

 so abundant on the artemisian plains of the West and 

 Southwest that its numbers cannot even be estimated, 

 and it will be so for many years to come, in all proba- 

 bility, as few men care to take up their abode in its 

 haunts. 



