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UNDER THE OPEN SKY 



rapidity of the stroke. Few birds can keep 

 up long at that rate, and the grouse usually 

 drops before he has gone more than a few 

 hundred yards. So accurate is his flight 

 that in spite of his speed he never strikes 

 against the trees, even in the closest forest. 

 To accomplish this his tail is broad, fan-like, 

 and strong; for the tail is the rudder of the 

 bird, and on all birds that fly accurately it 

 must be well developed. 



WHITE MEAT 



Our common chicken, degenerate though 

 she is through captivity, flies for a short 

 distance with just the same motion of the 

 wings as the ruffed grouse. This is one of 

 the outward evidences of her not very dis- 

 tant kinship with this, the finest game-bird 

 in the eastern United States, the wild turkey 

 alone excepted. Many birds in this family, 

 including our own domestic chicken and 

 turkey, and the grouse and bob-white 

 amongst our wild birds, have taken so much 

 to running and are so little given to sus- 

 tained flight that the muscles of the breast 



