WILD TURKEY. 257 
distinction until a very advanced age; and being preferable 
for the table, the hunters single them from the flock, and kill 
them in preference to the others. The female wild turkey is 
more frequently furnished with the hairy tuft than the tame 
one, and this appendage is gained earlier in life. The number 
of young hens without it has given rise to the incorrect asser- 
tion of a few writers, that the female is always destitute of it. 
The weight of the hen generally averages about nine pounds 
avoirdupois. Mr Audubon has shot barren hens, in straw- 
berry time, weighing thirteen pounds; and he has seen some 
few so fat as to burst open by falling from a tree, after being 
shot. The male turkeys differ more in bulk and weight : 
from the accounts I have received from various parts of the 
Union, fifteen or twenty pounds may be considered a fair state- 
ment of their medium weight; but birds of thirty pounds are 
not very rare, and I have ascertained the existence of some 
weighing forty. In relation to those surpassing the last-men- 
tioned weight, according to the report of authors who do not 
speak from personal observation, I have not been able to find 
any, and am inclined to consider them as fabulous. Mr 
Audubon informs us he saw one in the Louisville market that 
weighed thirty-six pounds ; the pectoral appendage of this bird 
measured more than a foot in length. Bartram describes a 
specimen of remarkable size and beauty, reared from an ege 
found in the forest, and hatched by acommon hen. When 
this turkey stood erect, the head was three feet from the ground. 
The animal was stately and handsome, and did not seem in- 
sensible of the admiration he excited. Our plate, which is the 
first that has been given of the wild turkey, represents both 
sexes, reduced to one-third of their natural size; the male was 
selected from among many fine specimens, shot in the month of 
April, near Engineer Cantonment, on the Missouri. It weighed 
twenty-two pounds; but as the males are very thin at that 
season,* when in good order it must have weighed much more. 
* The extraordinary leanness of this bird, at particular seasons of the 
year, has become proverbial in many Indian languages. An Omawhaw, 
who wishes to make known his abject poverty, says, “ Vah pawne zezecah 
ha go ba,’—“ T am as poor as a turkey in summer.” 
VOL, III, R 
