T

NO Benjamin Franklin is ascribed the honor of having been the first to make the sage observation that the lordly but companionable turkey, companionable turkey, rather than the bald and misanthropic eagle, should have been selected as the emblem of the Republic. If Franklin was the first, however, at least ten thousand newspaper paragraphers and humorists contend for the distinction of being the latest, repeating the remark with various amplifications and arguments to prove its justice at least twice a year. Nor is the contention lacking in plausibility and a show of reason. The eagle is a pirate a freebooter of the air, seeking out whom he may slay, and showing no mercy to the innocent and helpless. By universal consent, he is regarded as symbolic of war and conquest, of the bloody battle-field, of the victory of the strong. Surely there is nothing in his history or his disposition that should recommend him to the favor of the nation that stands for peace, conciliation, justice and relief to all that are oppressed. It was the emblem of the Roman Republic through its career of conquest, and of the Roman Empire in the melancholy days of its richly merited decline. It was the emblem of France in the arrogant days of the Bonapartes, and is still the symbol of boastful Prussia, decadent Austria and tottering Russia. Surely, it is neither wise, appropriate nor

politic to class the land of the free along with the conquering and corrupt despotisms and autocracies of the past and present by holding up for the adoration of the patriotic the same symbol that crowned their standards and led their legions on to bloody victory or to deserved defeat. The true bird of freedom is the fat and juicy turkey-a native of the soil, but alien the effete and oppressive militarisms of the Old World. He feeds not on carrion and offal, nor on the carcasses of victims of his strength, like the eagle and other foul birds of prey, but upon the berries, fruits, seeds and nuts of the fields and woodlands. He is a true aborigine-native to the soil of every State and territory in the union, from the Rio Grande to the Red River of the north; from the Golden Gate to Cape Cod; from the Straits of Florida to Puget Sound. In dignity of carriage, in grace of movement, in symmetry of form and in beauty of plumage, no bird of prey can rival him. He is a fitting symbol of peace, plenty, prosperity, content, good feeling and good cheer. cheer. Well might his counterfeit presentment be blazoned upon our national escutcheon-the most appropriate and distinctive emblem of triumphant democracy that can well be imagined.

Nevertheless, if the fathers of the Republic builded not wisely in this regard, their work will doubtless continue to en

3

dure, and the turkey, defrauded of his birthright, will play but a minor role in the drama of events. But twice each year does he come into his own, and then in a manner too tragic to fitly compensate for the intervening seasons of neglect. If not the villain of the play, he meets the villain's fate. Nevertheless, his life goes out in a blaze of glory, and if his end is not heroic, it is far from ignoble. He is the true lord of the feast (even though he be trussed and basted), at Thanksgiving and Christmas time, when the piratic eagle hardly receives a passing thought. Probably the haughty gobbler loses but little sleep in bootless worry over the fact that the bald and worthless eagle has usurped the place that rightfully belongs to him. If he does, he might derive some consolation from the thought that he is loved for himself alone; the eagle only for what he symbolizes.

The turkey was introduced into Europe by the Spaniards early in the Sixteenth Century, and reteived immediate recognition as a valuable addition to the short list of domestic fowls. Of the gifts of the New World and the Old, this was neither the least important nor the least appreciated. Like corn and tobacco, potatoes and the peanut, maple syrup and the pumpkin pie, it plays a part in promoting the amenities and softening the manners of men and nations that historians and chroniclers are too prone to neglect. A wise man of old won everlasting renown by the exhortation, "Let me write the songs of a nation, and I care not who leads its armies." Let us put in a bid for fame by parodying it thus, "Let us serve the rapid fire lunches of a people, and we care not who builds its battleships." Feed them on a diet of turkey, buckwheat cakes and pumpkin pies, and ere long a race of poets, sages and philosophers would be evolved whose productions would make the classics of the Augustan age seem like the drivelings of idiocy in comparison.

How or why the turkey received the name by which it is known has long been a matter of dispute. Probably it was bestowed as a result of the confusion of geographical ideas that that prevailed for many decades after the discovery of America. It was not suspected that Columbus had pioneered the way to a

new hemisphere, but was thought that he had simply found a short route to the Indies. The name, Turkey, was not then restricted to a single country of well-defined limits, but was loosely applied, like the expression, "the Indies," to any part of the Orient. It is, therefore, probable that the turkey was so named for the purpose of indicating its supposed Oriental origin. Under the same misapprehension, the French named it "coq d'Inde," or "Indian cock," and to this day call it "dinde." This derivation, however, is by no means universally accepted, and amateur etymologists have exhausted their ingenuity in the attempt to invent a more satisfactory hypothesis. Some think that the red, wattled head of the male bird suggested the red cap or "fez," worn by the Turks. Others imagine that the blustering turkey cock reminded observers of the belligerant attitude of the hated followers of the Prophet, in the Middle Ages. By some it is believed that the name is a corruption of the word "turquoise," referring to the steel-blue color seen on the plumage of the wild fowl, and by still others it is fancied that it is an onomatopoetic word, imitating the call of the bird to its mate, or of the mother to her young.

Whatever the origin of the name, there is no disputing the fact that the wild turkey is the noblest game bird indigenous to the Western hemisphere. Centuries of pot hunting and persecution have exterminated it in some of the older States and have sadly thinned the flocks in all parts of the country; but in the heavily timbered districts, even in the thirteen original States, turkeys are still abundant enough to furnish royal sport to the hunter, while in nearly every State in the West there are unsettled districts in which this species of game is plentiful. In Western Texas and portions of Arizona, New Mexico, Wyoming, Utah, Montana, the Dakotas and other States, even the hunters of big game consider it not beneath their dignity to engage in the pursuit of this king of American wild fowl.

The wild turkey, it should not be forgotten, is incomparably superior to the domesticated fowl in size, beauty, intelligence and flavor-this being one of the few species that have deteriorated under man's influence, notwithstanding his ef

forts to achieve the contrary result. The French Canadians have a proverb, "Hebete comme une dinde "-"as stupid as a turkey." It is evident that the coiners of the phrase had the domesticated fowl in mind, as the wild bird possesses quite enough intelligence to tax the sagacity of the most experienced hunter. In recognition of the fact that the barnyard fowl is but a degenerate scion of a noble ancestry, breeders make a practice of capturing wild turkey cocks, or of filching the eggs of wild fowl for hatching, whenever possible, in order to introduce a strain of fresh, vigorous and undegenerate blood into their flocks.

The turkey was domesticated by the aborigines of the Southwest and by the Aztecs of Mexico ages before the white man first set foot on this continent. By these it was reared for the sake of its feathers, rather than for its meat, although there is no reason to suppose that the meat was wasted. The beautiful feather cloth obtained by the Spaniards when they looted the city of the Montezumas-so highly prized that gifts of it were sent to the Castilian monarchs, and are still preserved among the royal treasures at Madrid, was made of ocellated turkey feathers. This feather cloth, too, was one of the most precious possessions of the Cliff Dwellers. It was buried along with their dead, and many specimens have been discovered among their ruined homes in the Mesa Verde and the Canon de Chelly. The ocellated turkey of Yucatan and Honduras is smaller than the variety indigenous farther north, but far more beautiful. Its plumage is dazzlingly lustrous, reflecting almost every color of the rainbow, and rendering it almost as resplendent as the peacock. The common bronze turkey of the barnyard is believed to be a cross between the northern and the Yucatan varieties. It is, therefore, quite possible that the fowl that dignifies the Christmas dinner by his august presence may be descended on the one hand from some lordly turkey cock that cracked acorns in the forests of New England before the Pilgrims landed, and on the other hand from a royal hen that ate corn in the coops of Montezuma before Cortez set forth on his career of conquest.

Of the turkeys of civilization, the bronze fowl of Rhode Island has the repu

tation of being the highest born, best bred and bluest blooded bird of his species in America. If one-half of the Rhode Island turkeys that are marketed every year really hailed from that pocket-edition commonwealth, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for them all to find roosting room within its narrow limits. Scarcely

less famous are the turkeys of Kentucky, where the soil and climate seem as well adapted to the development of this choice gift of the gods as to the production of those other boons no less desired-beautiful women, fast horses and incomparable corn-juice. In the Blue Grass Commonwealth the turkeys are reared by negroes on their little patches of land. During the early days of December, the country roads are dotted with marching flocks, driven by tattered men and little black pickaninnies, all converging towards the towns. The scene is one of rustic and Arcadian simplicity that the globe trotter will long cherish in his memory, when imposing pageants and majestic of nature have been forgotten.

scenes

Ac

It would be interesting to know just how many turkeys will be slaughtered within the next few weeks "to make a Christian holiday," but unfortunately no statistics of the kind can be secured. cording to the Twelfth Census, there were in the United States on June 1, 1900, only 6,599,367 domesticated turkeys over three months of age. The leading State in the turkey raising industry was Texas, with 648,671 birds, while Illinois stood second with 446,020, and Iowa was a close third with 424,306. However, these figures fall far short of conveying a true conception of the magnitude of the turkey raising business. At the season of the year when the census enumerators made their rounds, but few of the turkeys that were destined to grace the feasts of Thanksgiving and Christmas had attained the age of three months; and millions, perhaps, had not yet broken the egg shells. When the census of 1890 was taken, an attempt was made to count turkeys of all ages, not restricting the enumeration to those more than three months old, and the reports gave the total number as being 10,754,060; but even these figures give no account of the millions of birds hatched after the first of June and butchered for the holiday

trade. It is therefore manifestly impossible to ascertain with any degree of accuracy how many turkeys are reared every year, or how many are slaughtered for the Christmas season, but the opinion of one of the largest buyers in the country may be of interest. In his opinion, the census figures of the year 1900 represent little more than the permanent stock kept for breeding purposes on the farms and ranges. He regards it as a reasonable estimate that at least ten turkeys turkeys are raised and killed for every one thus kept permanently. If this estimate be even approximately correct, and if allowance be made for the growth of the industry

since the Twelfth Census was taken, then more than 65,000,000 turkeys have been reared for table consumption this year.

Although Americans regard the turkey as peculiarly their own, yet it is highly appreciated in every country in Europe as well as in many parts of Asia, Africa and Australia. Its fame, in fact, is coextensive with civilization. In Englan the turkey raising industry is carried on to an extent never attempted on this side of the Atlantic. The leading centers of the business are Norfolk and Cambridgeshire, where hundreds of thousands of turkeys are reared every year for the London market.

minor undulations, to the south, and rising abruptly into the snow-clad peaks called the Highlands; to the east lay the ponderous spine of the continent-the main range of the Rocky Mountainshuge, bearded, forbidding, like a monster of the Jurassic Age, sullenly taking his rest; finally, to the westward, the hill itself culminated in a steep, barren "butte," at once giving the settlement its name and bearing evidence of volcanic upheaval in ages past. Verily, this was no Garden of the Gods, but rather a grotesque region where elemental forces had held mighty sway. While the traveler noted these things, an old prospector, weary of the precarious luck of placer mining, approached and offered him six claims on the lean looking hill for five hundred dollars. The traveler, a lawyer by profession, had in his wallet just the exact sum. It was a curious coincidence; six claims for five hundred dollars, and his wallet held the stated price in gold. dust. However, the thing seemed preposterous even for a gamble, so he refused the old man's offer, and mounting his horse, went his way. Within the lifetime of that same traveler, those claims had yielded over a billion dollars; the hill had shed its pine clumps for forests of bristling chimneys and shaft houses, and the obscure camp had become the greatest copper district in the world.

six

The story, much as it sounds like romance, is literally true, and the magical transformation from the "forest primeval" to the city has happened in less than forty years! There are immense dynamic forces at work not only in the

earth itself, but in the air, and under their influence full-lunged and warmblooded men act vigorously and achieve. No effete luxuries here to cajole the senses into idleness; no perfume of flower and vista of fat valley with low of kine and tinkle of distant bell; no amorous south wind to relax the tension and sooth to stagnation. No! rather stern, muscle-bearing toil; the ring of pick on rock, the throb and roar of mighty engines undoing with iron might the sedimentary work of Nature through the ages; an environment of naked cliff and crag and chastened winds from snowcold heights that sparkle, lash and compel. Such are the external conditions, and the same goal, deep-buried in the mountain's breast, is the impetus that draws, binds and rewards.

Originally, Butte, like all other northwestern camps, was purely a placer district; then the "Alice," with the pioneer shaft of the hill, set the precedent in actual quartz mining, and produced silver. It was not until 1881 that Marcus Daly sank the main shaft of the famous "Anaconda" to great depth in search of copper. This shrewd miner spent a fortune before the vast body of copper was struck, revealing the real wealth of the camp. It was then that Butte came into prominence, and capital and labor flocked to the new field. The day of the old prospector who owned and worked his little holding was gone forever. The hill was too rich and the stake too big for single individuals. Henceforth it was to be Company and Union-Magnate and Laborer.

In 1889, the Boston and Montana Company sent a young engineer, F. Augustus Heinze, to Butte, to look after its interests. Mr. Heinze was a keen mining man of German antedecedents and rich con

nections abroad. In his capacity of expert, or engineer, he became intimately acquainted with the properties of the "B and M," their deviations in consequence of the right of way bestowed upon