AVERY BIRD COLLECTION 43 



of a barnyard cock. Under a different state of affairs 

 these four hens and four cocks might have bred me a 

 large flock of turkeys. 



"It was just after our civil war, reconstruction of the 

 states was undergoing its accomplishment, and the freed- 

 man, armed with his sham-dam skelp, was ubiquitous; 

 and my turkeys, as well as every other species of game 

 or vermin, were objects of his pursuit. Squirrels were 

 almost exterminated, except in the river bottoms. The 

 mocking-bird, even, did not escape this promiscuous 

 slaughter. I saw one day, on my place, two negro boys, 

 about eighteen years old; they both had guns, and when 

 interrogated as to the species of game their bags contain- 

 ed, they made some evasive answer. I thrust my hand 

 into the sack and drew out four mocking-birds. Indigna- 

 tion seized me, and the reader may imagine that I used 

 some very strong language at this ruthless destruction 

 of a bird that the worst white boy in the South would 

 hestitate to kill. 



"My turkeys being very gentle, as I said, and daily at- 

 tention and feeding from the hand preventing shyness, 

 or any disposition to wander far from home in the breed- 

 ing season, the hens laid in the yard. Sambo and his 

 sister discovered the nests, and the eggs were stolen. 

 Thwarted thus at first, the four hens wandered far from 

 the house to find a safe retreat for their nests. One flew 

 at least a half a mile every morning before she alighted, 

 and fed along toward her nest, about two miles distant. 

 She returned home to roost late in the evening ; but after 

 she went to sitting I did not see her again. She reared a 

 brood, as I afterward learned from a neighbor, who saw, 

 with her, in his field, a young wild turkey nearly grown, 

 and as the field lay in the direction taken by my hen, I 

 inferred that it must be my lost turkey and her brood. 

 One of the other three hens brought home five nearly 

 grown turkeys ; but where she nested or how she escaped 

 being killed, I knew not; I did know, however, that she 

 was stolen from the yard fence where she roosted with 

 her family. Silly bird ! If she had known Sambo's thiev- 

 ish propensities as well as I knew them, she would have 



