354 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Aug. 26, 1911. 
Y OU know mallards—wisest and wariest of all 
ducks—Solomons of the air. You can't knock 
down mallards with a paddle nor can you get them 
with a gun that plasters its shots all over the face 
of creation. 
A mallard shot is generally a long shot, and long 
shots require a hard-shooting, close-shooting gun. 
That’s why the long-headed man who goes to a 
mallard country takes a Lefever. When he swings 
it on a towering pair of mallards he does not ques¬ 
tion the result. He know it— 
TWO CLEAN KILLS 
The reason a Lefever kills clean and sure and 
far is Lefever Taper Boring. 
But if you buy a Lefever for the taper boring 
alone, you will get more than your money’s worth. 
For instance, you will never be handicapped with 
looseness at the hinge joint. The exclusive Lefever 
screw compensates for a year’s wear by a trifling 
turn that you make yourself with a screwdriver. 
LEFEVER 
SHOT GUNS 
Sixteen other exclusive Lefever features and Lefe¬ 
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Ittarlin 
REPEATER 
Model 
1897 
The best-made 
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Shoots all .22 short, .22 long and .22 long rifle 
cartridges without change in adjustment; ex¬ 
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foxes and all small game and target work up 
to 200 yards. 
It’s a take-down, convenient to carry and clean. The tool 
steel working parts cannot wear out. It s Ivory Bead and 
Rocky Mountain sightsare the best set ever furnished on any 
.22. Has lever action—like a big game rifle; has solid top 
and side ejection for safety and rapid accurate firing—the 
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Note the beautiful case-hardened finish and the superb build 
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TAe TPIar/iJi firearms Co. 
27 Willow Street, New Haven, Conn. 
When writing say you saw the advertisement 
in “Forest and Stream.’* 
They are delicious eating, but the old birds re¬ 
quire very long hanging. The Russian name, 
pronounced “Indushka gournial” (wild turkey), 
is a good description of the appearance and 
taste of their flesh. The figures of a cock and 
hen of this species in Dresser’s “Birds of 
Europe’’ are fairly good, but the yellow on the 
legs, bill, and round the eye is not nearly bright 
enough. I had no means of weighing one, but 
I should think that an old cock must scale 
nearly as heavy as a hen capercaillie. 
The Caucasian blackgame live at a somewhat 
lower level than the snow partridges, though I 
sometimes saw old birds, chiefly cocks, actu¬ 
ally in company with, or quite close to, their 
larger neighbors. 
In September the immature cocks had al¬ 
ready separated from the young broods of hens, 
and were in lots by themselves, or with a 
sprinkling of old cocks to look after them. The 
hens, except a few probably barren birds, were 
at a lower level in the long grass at about 
9,500 feet, but very seldom below the timber 
line. I once saw about thirty old cocks sitting 
round a little terrace of short grass, with a 
herd of chamois in the middle of them. Some 
of these cocks were spreading their tails and 
displaying, as if it were early spring, instead 
of a misty October morning. They are not, I 
think, quite such heavy birds as our blackgame, 
nor do the cocks come up to ours in point of 
beauty. They lack the brilliant blue gloss on 
the back, and their tails are less curved, and 
have not the white feathers below them which 
give such a finish to the common blackcock. 
Living on steep ground, their flight is very like 
that of the snow partridge, but their first down¬ 
ward plunge takes them even further from 
the side of the hill. After stooping right out 
into space, they seem suddenly to remember 
where they want to go. Bending their necks, 
they “put on the brake,” with their long curved 
tails tucked down, so to speak, between their 
legs, then wheel off to left or right toward the 
hill again, curling upward before they alight. 
The wings of the cocks in flight make a very 
pleasant, gentle humming sound. They are 
much tamer than the snow partridges, but, after 
one or two lessons, the old gentlemen take a 
good deal of circumventing. The young 
Georgian hens have no more sense than their 
Scotch cousins,, but are, I think, better eating. 
Camp appetite may account for that. Their 
food seemed to be similar to that of the snow 
partridge. The natives find powder and shot 
too expensive to waste on either of these birds, 
but they are both systematically hunted by 
eagles and by a falcon, which was either a saker 
or a lanner—I think the latter. I never actually 
saw a kill, but there was no doubt in my mind 
or the gamebirds’ what these two birds of prey 
were after. It was a fine sight to see the par¬ 
tridges and blackgame swooping from the rocks 
and hurtling round the next corner when an 
eagle floated into their view, every partridge 
screaming his loudest as he flew, and the black¬ 
game racing away to safety below them. At a 
much lower level, where the mountain forests 
join the southern plain, I heard that pheasants 
were very common, but I only passed hurriedly 
through their home, and never saw one. 
CATS AND GROUND-NESTING BIRDS. 
The domestic cat turned poacher is a terror 
to sitting game, and capable of widespread de¬ 
struction. She is so small, active, and silent in 
her movements, and so fierce, that she excels 
even the fox as a destroyer of sitting birds. 
Should a cat be suspected, says the Shooting 
Times, the first thing to do is to examine care¬ 
fully every twig, thorn, and briar near, and in 
nearly every case some of the fur will be found 
left by the cat, snatched off as she pounced on 
her victim. She will also have a big struggle 
with the bird actually on the nest before over¬ 
powering it, and the eggs are certain to be dis¬ 
placed. if not scattered outside. Feathers will 
be pulled off wholesale in the struggle. Be¬ 
yond what has been described, a cat will not in¬ 
terfere with the eggs, and a meal is generally 
made off the bird at a little distance. 
O’GRADY’S TWINS. 
“An’ ye’re detarmined to keep thim both?” 
said McLoughlin, the village cobbler, to Denis 
O’Grady, as, one fine evening, the worthy cronies 
sat in the old-time tap-room of the “Ballyhilly 
Arms.” 
“An’ what d’ ye think I’d do wid thim?” re¬ 
plied Denis. “Is it a pie ye’d make iv the poor 
little shiverin’ divils? Av coorse, I’ll rare thim, 
for sure the ould counthry has need iv some 
fresh blood, an’ it’s many’s the foundlin’s turned 
out betther nor the ould stock, as I can tell ye.” 
“It’s the grand nurse ye’ll make, Denis,” said 
the cobbler, between the puffs of his “church¬ 
warden.” 
“Sure, an’ it’s not but I like thim well enough 
to nurse thim day an’ night for that matter, but 
their mother, too, by the same token, ’ll find 
shelter wid thim until sich times as Denis 
O’Grady thinks fit, for it’s not in the family to 
turn the helpless from the dure, when the bit 
an’ the sup’s convanient.” 
“Och! an’ I know that, Denis,” replied the 
shoe doctor, “an’ if all the world was the same 
there wouldn’t be such thrawin’ an’ pullin' to 
make both ends meet.” 
Denis here gave a couple of loud raps on the 
table with his tumbler, and called to the pot¬ 
boy: “Two more bottles iv ‘Double X,’ if ye 
plaze, Mr. John-come-last, for it’s not ivery man 
has a pair iv iligant twins laid on his doorstep 
for a present, begob!” 
“Well, more power to ye, Denis,” was the 
toast of McLoughlin, as he raised the glass of 
stout to his lips. "But what does the old woman 
say about it?” 
“Begorra, she didn’t like it at all, an’ thrait- 
ened to put thim out in the sthreet again, an’ 
vowed 'twas meself had a hand in the pie. But 
sure, she’s tindher-hearted as meself, an’ the 
sight iv the poor little darlin’s, all cowld an’ 
shiverin’ an’ cryin’ like mad for their mother, 
made her pitiful all at wanst, an’ she wrapped 
them up in an ould blanket an’ commenced feed- 
in’ them all as wan as they were her own.” 
“An’ what’s the mother like?” whispered 
Micky. 
“As purty a little thing as iver ye set eyes on, 
an’ Molly’s took on wid her an’ thim as if they 
were our own grandchildher an’ born undher 
our own roof. But ye mustn’t think that I’d 
’av’ seen them turned out for anythin’ the ould 
woman ’d say, for ye must know, Micky, that 
it’s meself's a Home Ruler out an’ out in some 
things, an’ this is one iv them.” 
“An’ it’s the thrue Christians ye are for that 
same, for sure it’s many a one ’d ’av’ sent for 
the police. Indade, didn’t I hear ould Peggy 
McCoy say it was a shame to put them at poor 
Denis O’Grady’s door, when there was others 
betther able to rare them.” 
“The ould scoundhrel iv a viper,” burst out 
Denis, furiously. “Sure, an’ she wants them her¬ 
self, an' it’s the sorry rarin’ they’d ’av’ had wid 
her, for her own childher’s like moultin’ spar¬ 
rows.” 
“I’m not sayin’ but it’s the dacent rarin’ ye’ll 
give them, Denis, an’ it’s not to be heedin’ ould 
weemin’s tongues, for sure they’d break a man’s 
heart wid their wagglin’,” put in McLoughlin, 
apologetically, adding: “An’ it’ll be like your 
young days back again to have them in the 
house, an’, be my soul, some iv the boys ’d like 
to be in your shoes this minit, O’Grady.” 
“That they would,” said the old hare-hunter, 
drawing himself up proudly, “an’ they’ll be a 
credit to the counthry-side, I’ll bet my brogues, 
if they be any relation iv their mother’s, for 
she’s the best bit iv blood in the town land, not 
barrin’ the young squire’s own; an’, whisper, 
Micky, hasn’t the masther give me a goolden 
sovereign for the first month’s milk, for, says 
he, there’s nothin’ like givin’ them a good start?” 
“The divil he has,” said Micky, “an’ sure it’s 
the King’s bounty ye desarve, Denis. But has 
he made any allowance for the bottle?” 
“Arrah, be aisy, Micky, haven’t I made them 
members iv the Band iv Hope, as it is, an’ it’s 
teetotallers they’ll be all their lives,” laughed 
Denis, jovially, “but for any sakes, Micky, don’t 
whisper it to me onld woman that I’m afther 
thratin’ ye out iv that same milk money, for ye 
