GAME-BIRDS 251 



big-game hunters. From this habit they ob- 

 tained a sort of immunity, for the gunner would 

 not spare time to hunt birds when there were 

 bear, deer, or moose to be taken. 



But in localities where their ranks had been 

 greatly thinned, a rapid change seemed to take 

 place in the temperamental character of the ruffed 

 grouse. Its blunted sense of fear seemed sud- 

 denly to alter into extreme timidity. Where be- 

 fore the bird had stupidly listened to the hunter's 

 footsteps with scarcely a thought that they might 

 presage danger, it now became a wild, wary, vigi- 

 lant creature, that took alarm while the gunner 

 was still a hundred yards off. It developed an 

 expert knowledge of the art of dodging behind 

 tree-trunks during flight and running before dogs 

 until a dense thicket could be reached where it was 

 possible to rise unseen, startling the gunner with 

 the roar of its wings and never offering him a shot. 

 It has proved one of those rare wild creatures 

 which, if left alone, rapidly grows tame, but which, 

 if much hunted, learns even more quickly to dodge 

 and keep out of the way. 



It is due wholly to this quick assimilation of 

 wildness that the ruffed grouse owes its longev- 

 ity in thickly settled areas. In the forests of 

 Maine and Michigan it is still plentiful and, be- 

 cause it is not over-hunted, appears tame and 

 stupid. But let the sportsman enter the forests 

 of New Jersey, the Blue Ridge, or even the scrub- 



