158 LEWIS'S AMERICAN SPORTSMAN. 



sidered extinct in the Northern and Middle States. Within a fe^ 

 years they were quite abundant on some portions of Long Island. 

 They were also to be found in Burlington county, New Jersey, 

 and in some few other places. There are, however, still a few to 

 be found on the Jersey plains, and every season we hear of some 

 of our sporting acquaintances exterminating a small pack. We 

 know of ten braces being killed this season, (1848,) and about the 

 same number last year, by the same party ; and, as usual, in both 

 instances these scarce and beautiful birds were butchered long 

 before the time sanctioned by the strong or rather the weak arm 

 of the law. 



Thus it is that the destructive hand of the would-be respectable 

 poacher, as well as the greedy gun of the pot-hunter, hastens to 

 seal the fate of the doomed prairie-hen in these Eastern regions ; 

 and we may predict with great certainty that ere long not one will 

 be found save upon the rich plains of the West ; from which, also, 

 in course of time, they will be driven, and ultimately perish, root 

 and branch, from before the unerring guns of their ruthless de- 

 stroyers. We understand that there are still a few of these birds 

 to be found in Pennsylvania, we believe in Northampton county, 

 where the pine forests are thin and open, and the country about 

 them such as prairie-hens delight in. They have always been 

 abundant in the barrens of Kentucky and Tennessee, as also in 

 the balmy plains and fertile prairies of Louisiana, Indiana, and 

 Illinois. So numerous were they a short time since in the barrens 

 of Kentucky, and so contemptible were they as game-birds, that 

 few huntsmen would deign to waste powder and shot on them. In 

 fact, they were held in pretty much the same estimation, or rather 

 abhorrence, that the crows are now in Pennsylvania or other of 

 the Middle and Southern States, as they perpetrated quite as much 

 mischief upon the tender buds and fruits of the orchards, as well 

 as the grain in the fields, and were often so destructive to the crops 

 that it was absolutely necessary for the farmers to employ their 

 young negroes to drive them away by shooting off guns and spring- 

 ing loud rattles all around the plantations from morning till night. 



