THE WILD TURKEY 47 



Grande turkey. These are, however, so much alike 

 as to be the same bird to a sportsman. In fact it 

 would take a very expert ornithologist, I am satisfied, 

 to distinguish the species where the birds are associ- 

 ated and have no doubt intermarried. The wild turkey 

 is an extinct bird in many of the Northern and Eastern 

 States, and is nowhere found in any numbers save in a 

 few places in the South and Southwest. It is difficult 

 to realize the numbers which existed some years ago. 

 William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) thus describes the abun- 

 dance of the turkeys in the West: "While at this 

 camp we had a lively turkey hunt. The trees along 

 the banks of the stream were literally alive with wild 

 turkeys, and after unsaddling the horses, between two 

 and three hundred soldiers surrounded a grove of tim- 

 ber and had a grand turkey round-up, killing four or 

 five hundred of the birds with guns, clubs, and stones. 

 Of course we had turkey in every style after this hunt 

 — roast turkey, boiled turkey, fried turkey, ' turkey 

 on toast ' and so on ; and we appropriately called this 

 place Camp Turkey." They were probably as abun- 

 dant in the Indian Territory a few years ago as any- 

 where. My brother found them fairly abundant in 

 Southern Texas, and there are places in the Gulf States 

 where there are still some turkeys. A few remain in 

 the mountains of Pennsylvania and the Virginias. 

 Like the other game birds, before they became intimate 

 with man they were so tame as to be called stupid. 

 Irving, in his " Tour on the Prairies,** so refers to them. 

 I found a few turkeys when partridge shooting a 

 few years ago in Northwestern Ohio and twice the 

 dogs pointed them. I saw one killed over a point in 



