Journeying West Before 1840

From A TOUR IN AMERICA,IN 1798, 1799, AND 1800.

By Richard Parkinson, 1805

pgs 303-310

The amusement of shooting (which is called gunning) will give but little pleasure to an English sportsman, as there is very little of what is termed game to be found in any part of America I visited.

The partridge is a small bird, about the size of the quail in England; and is commonly brought alive to market, as young chickens are in England, which in flavour it resembles more than any other thing. Partridges are chiefly taken by negroes, who have a device for snaring whole coveys together, in a box.

The pheasant is about the size of the English partridge, and tastes more like game than the American partridge. Their woodcocks are smaller than ours; the snipe is nearly the same: and the two last-mentioned kinds afford the only amusement worth noticing as a diversion. It is the custom to shoot at every bird that flies, and eat them all. There is not so great a number of birds in America as in England: a hedgeful of sparrows there would make a most excellent day's sport. There are many woodpeckers of different sorts.

Their doves are about the size of turtle-doves, and are good eating. They are taken, in large quantities, in nets or boxes. The contrivance is, to catch four, put out the eyes of two, and tie them to a stake with a piece of string to the leg: the other two they then also tie by the leg, with a string sufficiently long to allow them to fly to some distance; and when the bird-catcher sees a flight of these doves, as they fly in very great numbers, he lets these two doves fly to meet them, having previously blackened a sufficient space of ground for the execution of their project, by grubbing up the earth, and strewing it with some sort of
food which they like: then the two blind doves are made to keep fluttering so that the large drove can see them. The man, being first secreted in some bushes, draws the two doves down to the black place where the two blind ones are; in consequence of which the whole of the doves light on the part blackened. The man then draws a net over them: and I have been told that in this manner as many as one hundred are taken at a time.

As to hares, they have none. There is a small rabbit, which is sometimes called a hare; it runs into the hollow trees or stumps, and requires rather the axe than the gun to take him. Squirrel-shooting is a favourite diversion: these animals are found in trees, and are sold in the markets to eat, as hares and rabbits are in England. There are many kinds of squirrels (the ground, little grey, great grey, red, black, fox, and flying squirrel) and foxes (the flying fox, black, red, great grey, and little grey fox). Opossums and racoons are another kind of animal, similar in taste to the squirrels.

The Americans shoot and eat most of these animals as game, except the foxes. They are taken by men who hunt all night with dogs and guns. The better sort of people enjoy no other diversion on horse-back than fox-hunting, which by an English sportsman would be deemed very indifferent pastime. The fox which these night-hunters take, and sell for five or six dollars, is put into a bag, and turned off in some open place, which is never half a mile from a wood; therefore there is only wood-hunting: and, although the woods do not abound with under-wood, yet they contain enough of it to prevent the horsemen from galloping. At Baltimore is an English huntsman, who is well acquainted with the management of hounds. Considering, however, the great irregularities of the hunters, in hallooing and cracking their whips, &c. the hounds perform wonders. Apparently the highest enjoyment of the horsemen is liberty and equality in making an extraordinary noise. The foxes do not break away, as with us, but dodge about, somewhat like our hare. Of the red and grey foxes, the only kinds I saw, the red is the best for diversion, and most commonly hunted. They both run very slow, compared with the English fox. The fences, which are usually five or six feet high, are such as are extremely inconvenient to horsemen.

The horses in America generally leap well; they are accustomed to leap from the time of foaling: as it is not at all uncommon, if the mare foal in the night, for some part of the family to ride the mare, with the foal following her, from eighteen to twenty miles the next day, it not being customary to walk much. I think that is the cause of the American horse having a sort of amble: the foal, from its weak state, goes pacing after the dam, and retains that motion all its life. The same is the case with respect to leaping: there being in many
places no gates, the snake or worm-fence (which is one rail laid on the end of another) is taken down to let the mare pass through, and the foal follow; but, as it is usual to leave two or three rails untaken down, which the mare leaps over, the foal, unwilling to be left behind, follows her; so that, by the time it is one week old, it has learned to leap three feet high; and progressively, as it grows older, it leaps higher, till, at a year old, it will leap its own height. There are part of the horses raised by a description of men having only one mare, which the owner or his wife rides to market once or twice a week to sell truck: therefore the foal is a traveller from its first existence.

To return to hunting.--The season for this diversion is short; it being a continued frost from December to April: but the hounds hunt in such weather as would deter an Englishman from even making the attempt. Probably on account of the woods preventing the effects of the frost.

There are deer in the back woods, but none near Baltimore, which they shoot as game; and I have heard the venison praised. I ate of it several times; but it was very indifferent, compared with the venison in England. It was exceedingly poor; and I think no venison good, except it be fat: nor do I believe any other animal in perfection, except it be fat. These wild deer are of various kinds; the moose, elk, round-horned, caribou, red, croft, roe, and fallow. The moose is so scarce and difficult to take, that Mr. Jefferson told me, when he was in France, and desirous of having one, it cost him seventy guineas to procure the skin, stuffed. There are few or no deer in any of the inhabited parts.

Venison is brought to market in waggons, and sold at the price of beef: it is shocking stuff. It is commonly salted, smoked, and served up raw at breakfast. When dressed in the fresh state, it is usual to cut it into a saddle, by chopping the shanks off about the pope's eye, and just warm it at the fire: every gentleman has a
chafing-dish, and may truly be said to be his own cook; for, what with the wood-embers and the stew of the venison, the room is like the kitchen of Dolly's chop-house in London. About eight gentlemen will eat all the flesh off the hind-quarters, and nearly pick the bones. The season when the venison comes to market is from September to March; sometimes with the skin on, sometimes without it.

There is a bird they call a robin, something like our fieldfare, which they shoot. There is another bird, named a whip-poor-Will, which makes such a noise that it is impossible to sleep after three o'clock in the summer's morning; for it comes near to the houses, perhaps in search of food.

In regard to the amusement of fishing, there are very few waters where the angler can make use of the hook and line; the rivers being more like seas, and generally shallow for some distance from the banks, which renders a boat necessary.