534 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING 



large number of them must have reached their destina- 

 tion in good condition seems obvious, since no less 

 than sixty-six are accounted for in the letter. 



Bobwhite was introduced into England in the earlier 

 half of the last century, and is reported to have done 

 well for a time. 



No serious attempt has been made to transplant 

 from one part of America to another any others of the 

 grouse, except that one or more consignments of sharp- 

 tailed grouse are said to have been shipped to Massa- 

 chusetts, where they were turned out and disappeared. 

 Sharp-tailed grouse were planted also on Grand Island 

 in Lake Superior, but this is in or close to the native 

 range of the species. What the fate of these Grand 

 Island sharp-tail grouse may have been we do not 

 know. Possibly they shared the fate of the exotic 

 grouse there introduced, all of which, we are told, have 

 disappeared. 



We read in the accounts of the early Spanish ex- 

 plorers that the wild turkey had been domesticated by 

 the Indians before the white man's coming. A consid- 

 erable portion of the sustenance of certain Florida In- 

 dians was drawn from their turkeys, and we are told 

 that the carnivorous animals in the great zoological 

 gardens kept up by the Aztec, Montezuma, were fed on 

 the flesh of turkeys. 



The domestic turkey is a descendant of the wild 

 turkey of the Southwest. The bird was carried to 

 Spain and thence spread over Europe, finally reaching 

 England. That the common wild turkey of the East 



