THE WILD TURKEY. 127 



It is, then, to the forests of our country, that the Old World 

 is indebted for one of the most common, but at the same time, 

 one of the most choice of all the barnyard Fowls that have, 

 by the ingenuity of man, been reclaimed from their native 

 haunts, to minister to his daily wants. 



" In a state of domestication, the Wild Turkey, though kept 

 separate from tame individuals, lose the brilliancy of their plum- 

 age in the third generation, becoming plain brown, and having 

 here and there white feathers intermixed." 



Wild Turkeys often, when opportunities offer, associate with 

 tame ones, and with great advantage to the latter, as it improves 

 the stock, making them more hardy, and consequently, less 

 difficult to raise. 



It is a subject of somewhat curious interest to examine the 

 various notions or theories that have been broached by different 

 writers, by way of explaining, in a satisfactory manner, how this 

 Fowl, entirely indigenous to the Western Hemisphere, should 

 have received the appellation of Turkey ; for this name would 

 very naturally seem to imply that the Bird was a native of the 

 East, rather than of the New World. 



This seeming paradox may, however, be reconciled by a 

 reference to the history of the period of its introduction into 

 England. The Turks were then in their zenith of glory, or 

 rather were in their most lawless state of rapine and plunder ; 

 insomuch that the whole nation was dreaded as well as despised 

 throughout all Christendom. 



Their ships, almost unmolested, swept the waters of the Medi- 

 terranean, while their fleet galleys laid waste the sunny shores 

 of Italia, as well as carried devastation along the coasts of 

 Hispania and the adjacent countries. As a nation, they were 

 nothing more than a horde of barbarians, a band of pirates, 

 leagued together for the purpose of carnage and pillage ; their 

 very name became a byword to all the more civilized people 

 of the Old World ; a token of contempt, a symbol of cruelty, 

 cowardice, and oppression. Such was the period of the advent 

 of this Fowl in England ; and coming as a stranger from distant 

 parts, no one knew where, nor did they care, as they were re- 

 garded as fancy Fowls alone, but most probably through the 

 medium of some of the British cruisers from the coast of Spain, 



