PINNATED GROUS. 491 



fore me in dismay the frightened Grous and her cowering brood. The 

 weather was extremely beautiful, and I thought that the Barrens must 

 have been the parts from which Kentucky derived her name of the " Gar- 

 den of the West !" 



There it was, that, year after year, and each successive season, I stu- 

 died the habits of the Pinnated Grous. It was there that, before sun- 

 rise, or at the close of day, I heard its curious boomings, witnessed its ob- 

 stinate battles, watched it during the progress of its courtships, noted its 

 nest and eggs, and followed its young until, fully grown, they betook 

 themselves to their winter quarters. 



When I first removed to Kentucky, the Pinnated Grous were so abun- 

 dant, that they were held in no higher estimation as food than the most 

 common flesh, and no " hunter of Kentucky" deigned to shoot them. 

 They were, in fact, looked upon with more abhorrence than the Crows are 

 at present in Massachusetts and Maine, on account of the mischief they 

 committed among the fruit trees of the orchards during winter, when 

 they fed on their buds, or while in the spring months they picked up the 

 grain in the fields. The farmer's children or those of his Negroes were 

 employed to drive them away with rattles from morning to night, and 

 also caught them in pens and traps of various kinds. In those days, 

 during the winter, the Grous would enter the farm-yard and feed with 

 the poultry, alight on the houses, or walk in the very streets of the vil- 

 lages. I recollect having caught several in a stable at Henderson, where 

 they had followed some Wild Turkeys. In the course of the same win- 

 ter, a friend of mine, who was fond of practising rifle-shooting, killed up- 

 wards of forty in one morning, but picked none of them up, so satiated 

 with Grous was he, as well as every member of his family. My own ser- 

 vants preferred the fattest flitch of bacon to their flesh, and not unfre- 

 quently laid them aside as unfit for cooking. 



Such an account may appear strange to you, reader ; but what will 

 you think when I tell you, that, in that same country, where, twenty-five 

 years ago they could not have been sold at more than one cent, a-piece, 

 scarcely one is now to be found ? The Grous have abandoned the State 

 of Kentucky, and removed (like the Indians) every season farther to the 

 westward, to escape from the murderous white man. In the Eastern States, 

 where some of these birds still exist, game-laws have been made for their 

 protection during a certain part of the year, when, after all, few escape to 

 breed the next season. To the westward you must go as far at least as the 



