PTARMIGAN. 217 
companied by so useful an auxiliary, I have no doubt that 
he could make a bag which for numbers would rival any 
formed of the grouse of the more southern prairies, or of 
the nut-brown beauties that love our English stubbles. 
One drawback exists to ptarmigan-shooting in America: 
the country the sportsman is compelled to seek them in is 
far beyond the borders of civilization, and freedom from 
intrusion has rendered them recklessly tame. Time after 
time I have seen them sit upon some bare, exposed piece of 
rock and refuse to be flushed, even after hurling stones at 
them from less than a dozen yards’ distance. 
Again, their flight (in contradistinction to those of Scot- 
land) is so short, that if the unfortunate bird have the luck 
to be missed, it can again and again be put up, till even the 
very worst of shots must ultimately bring it to bag. 
They are beautiful birds, either in their summer or 
winter plumage, and the confidence which they exhibit in 
man’s good intentions toward them can not fail to endear 
them to him. Thus, I have never shot the ptarmigan but 
with regret, for here you have no crafty game, to accom- 
plish whose destruction you must call into play all the cun- 
ning of your nature. 
They unquestionably rank among the game of America, 
or I should have left them unnoticed. So if the sportsman, 
through my instructions, should visit their habitat, pray de- 
sist from useless slaughter. 
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