THE RUFFED GROUSE. 49 



ahead, for all too deceptive is that graceful 

 speed. 



At the sound of your first barrel a tail-feather 

 comes whiffling down into the glowing top of a 

 goldenrod, but only the faster does the grouse 

 dash the sunshine from its obstreperous wing. 

 Bang-goes the second barrel, aimed farther ahead, 

 but not a plume of the outspread fan is folded, 

 the graceful head seems only stretched out a 

 little farther, the black ruffs glisten but the more. 

 In a moment the whole is but a haze of brown 

 above which two curving wings are suddenly set, 

 while it plunges into the densest part of the 

 thicket as easily as a meteor into the night. 



Few of those who love this bird have seen him 

 before he has left his mother's side to roam alone 

 the mountain's breast or the tangled glen. For 

 his cradle is deep in the heart of summer's wealth, 

 and few are the eyes that can follow him into the 

 dark brake or the shaggy robe of the mountain 

 until frosts have rent the gay canopy and scat- 

 tered the fragments to the ground. But in the 

 bluffs of the upper Mississippi this grouse was 

 easily found in summer, especially after the 

 coveys were big enough to fly, and they used 



