46 



THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY, 



were unsuspicious and familiar — now they are cautious and 

 exceedingly vigilant; formerly, they fed on open ground, 

 could be seen by the road-side, or in the foot-path of the 

 passenger — but now, every noise alarms them, and they 

 glean their simple fare only in the tall grass and stubble, 

 or among the bushes. A few shots at a covey of Partridges 

 will put them more on the alert than the visitations of their 

 natural enemies, and in this way the Sportsman destroys 

 that state of domesticity in these birds which may be ob- 

 servable on all those farms prohibited to the footsteps of 

 the shooter. He drives them from open grounds into 

 greater security against various other enemies; and while 

 those birds, which have been fostered and protected in the 

 covetousness of the farmer, fall an easy prey to the snares 

 and traps abounding on such farms, the others are suspi- 

 cious of every thing, and will avoid the most ingenious 

 devices laid to entrap them; and by reason of their seek- 

 ing constant shelter in better cover, they more readily 

 escape the vigilance of hawks. 



Landholders are greatly mistaken, when they suppose 

 that they afford sure protection to their Partridges by ex- 

 excluding Sportsmen from visiting their grounds. Many 

 of these will tell you, that " they wish their birds pre- 

 served, and do not wish you to shoot them." And yet 

 if you will visit the nooks and corners of their fields and 

 thickets, you will find an abundance of traps and snares. 

 Their prohibition does not, therefore, arise from any re- 

 spect to the welfare of the birds, so much as to gratify 

 their avaricious dispositions, by catching the birds them- 

 selves, and vending them in market. Their mode of 

 catching these birds, too, is often attended with much 

 cruelty. The writer has often, in his rambles, found traps 

 and snoods, containing birds; and in several instances, when 

 confined in the former, they appeared in a half-starved 

 condition; and in the latter, the poor prisoners, half 

 choked, had been dangling by the neck for days. But so 

 long as avarice is the ruling principle of these men, it is 

 all in vain to talk of preserving game on farms adjacent to 

 any good market. 



It is much to be regretted that the price of Partridges 

 is so high. Fifty cents a pair can be readily obtained for 

 them, at this time, in the Philadelphia market; and while 

 such inducements are held out to covetous farmers and 

 others to destroy Partridges, it is not to be wondered at, 

 that Sportsmen should be forbidden to visit places where 

 these birds are found. If farmers sincerely wish to 

 have a due proportion of these truly interesting birds at all 

 times on their plantations, let them first destroy all the 

 snares and traps about them, and then drive poachers, or 

 gunners, from their premises, especially during that pe- 

 riod when the earth is covered with snow. The latter 



persons will oftentimes destroy an entire covey of Part- 

 ridges at a single shot; and, if even two or three should 

 escape the destructive fire, they will more than likely pe- 

 rish by the severity of the weather, for want of sufficient 

 company to keep them warm at night, as it is known, by 

 their manner of roosting, they impart equal warmth to 

 each other. During the first snows of the season, I have 

 known some reckless gunners to follow the trail of Part- 

 ridges along hedge-rows, until the birds would huddle 

 together in a space not eighteen inches in diameter, when, 

 with a deadly fire, they would kill two-thirds of their 

 number. And on one occasion, I knew a man, after he 

 had thus succeeded in getting a covey huddled up, to fire 

 on them, and on going up, finding one bird escaped, and 

 thirteen dead, he expressed great dissatisfaction that he 

 did not get the whole of them. 



I think, then, it is by no means the interest of farmers 

 to exclude Sportsmen from shooting on their grounds, if 

 visited by them in moderation. A Sportsman may be 

 known by his dogs, manner of hunting, and the seasons he 

 appropriates to that amusement. No Sportsman will hunt 

 in the snow, and all others gunning on Partridge grounds, 

 at that time, should lie driven off. 



I have strictly observed, for some years, that protected 

 grounds abound with fewer Partridges than those parts 

 hunted over season after season by Sportsmen, and sim- 

 ply for the reason before stated, that their half-domesticity 

 renders them an easy prey to their enemies. I have had 

 my favourite districts, within a short distance to a day's 

 ride of Philadelphia; over these I have hunted successfully 

 every year for a number of years; and every succeeding 

 season brought along with it the same plenitude of birds. 

 Two spots, one within seven, and the other forty miles of 

 this city, have been my favourites. These I have visited, 

 the former nearly every week during the sporting season; 

 and the latter, every day or two for several weeks at a 

 time. On the first, (sometimes with a companion,) I have 

 invariably bagged from fifteen to forty birds, and on one 

 occasion sixty ! Sixty Partridges, or full}' four coveys, off 

 of one district, in a single hunt; and.yet the next season, the 

 number of birds seemed undiminished. On the latter 

 ground, I have even been more successful, from which I 

 have never bagged less than twenty, and from that num- 

 ber up to forty-five birds; perhaps the general average 

 would be twenty-five, and I seldom commenced my 

 shooting season until the 15th of October. With this 

 continued success, I have never found the number of birds 

 less on the succeeding season, until the inclemency of the 

 weather, a few winters ago, nearly depopulated all of the 

 middle and northern states of Partridges. 



I think most Sportsmen will agree with me in these ob- 



