THE TURKEY 67 



hoppers, are their favorite haunts. Their timid na- 

 ture makes them very docile. A child armed with a 

 long switch is enough to lead the flock to the fields, 

 however numerous it may be. Then, step by step, 

 to-day in one direction, to-morrow in another, the 

 flock explores the stubble and gleans the grain fallen 

 from the ear, traverses the grassy meadows where 

 the crickets leap, and penetrates the woods where is 

 found abundant pasturage of chestnuts, beechnuts, 

 and acorns. 



* ' In spite of these rambles afield, which remind it a 

 little of the wandering life it leads in the immense 

 forests of its native country, the turkey never ac- 

 quires in domesticity the plumpness of body and 

 richness of plumage that belong to it in its free state. 

 It is a curious fact that, contrary to all our expe- 

 rience with other animals, which have improved un- 

 der human care and have increased in size, the tur- 

 key alone has degenerated in our hands, as if preyed 

 upon by an ineradicable regret for its native forests, 

 where bellows the buffalo, chased by the red-skinned 

 Indian. The domestic turkey is not much more than 

 half as large as the wild one. And then what a dif- 

 ference in the plumage ! Our poultry-yard fowl is 

 of a uniform black or of a dull red, sometimes white. 

 The bird of the wooded solitudes of the New World 

 is splendid in costume. Bronzed brown predom- 

 inates, but the neck, throat, and back have, in the 

 light, metallic reflections; and as the plumage is 

 clearly imbricated, the whole gives the appearance 

 of scale armor in gold and steel. Furthermore, the 



