386 GAME BIRDS. WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



and will be stirring betime, may kill halfe a dozen in a morn- 

 ing." Nuttall (183-1) states that according to Governor Win- 

 throp this Grouse formerly was so abundant on the bushy 

 plains in the neighborhood of Boston that laborers and servants 

 stipulated in agreements with their masters that they should 

 not have it "brought to table oftener than a few times in the 

 week." 



As the Heath Hen is not primarily a forest bird, the settle- 

 ment of the land and the clearing away of the forests favored 

 its increase, and had it been properly protected it might have 

 been plentiful now in southern New England; but this was 

 not to be. In early times it probably was confined mainly to 

 the more open lands along the coast and to the river vallej^s; 

 but the settlers cleared land and sowed grain and grass, thereby 

 adding largely to its feeding grounds and increasing the supply 

 of seeds and insects. This naturally would have increased 

 the numbers of the species; but it was pursued, trapped and 

 shot at all seasons; the young were destroyed by dogs and 

 cats, and thus the Heath Hens soon were reduced in numbers 

 and driven to dense thickets which hunters and dogs found it 

 difficult to penetrate. In such regions this Grouse persisted in 

 considerable numbers until the nineteenth century. It never 

 has been adequately protected by law until recent years, for, 

 although some States passed laws for its protection, such 

 laws rarely were enforced. Nuttall (1834) asserts that it is 

 still met with in New Jersey, Long Island, Martha's Vineyard 

 and at Westford, Conn. Peabody (1839) states that it is 

 found in Massachusetts only on Martha's Vineyard and one 

 small island near it, and the same year Lewis rated it as "very 

 rare and almost extinct in the northern and middle states; 

 but within a few years quite abundant in portions of Long 

 Island. . . .A few," he says, "are still found on the Jersey 

 Plains," and "every year we hear of the extermination of a 

 small pack." Giraud states (1844) that on Long Island it is 

 very nearly if not quite extinct, and that occasionally it is 

 seen near Schooly's Mountains, New Jersey, and in Pennsyl- 

 vania and Kentucky. According to William Dutcher the last 

 specimen recorded from New York was killed in the Comae 



