466 



THE NEST OF THE PHEASANT. 



deception of poachers, is, however, too amusing to be omitted. Those nocturnal marauders 

 were accustomed to haunt the fir plantations at night, and by looking upwards could easily see 

 the Pheasants as they sat asleep across the branches, and bring them down with the gun, 



or even a noose on 

 a long rod. So, 

 thinking that pre- 

 vention was better 

 than prosecution, 

 he first planted a 

 number of thick 

 holly clumps, dark 

 as night in the in- 

 terior, and quite 

 impervious to hu- 

 man beings unless 

 cased in plate ar- 

 mor. The Pheas- 

 ants soon resorted 

 to these fortresses, 

 but their places 

 were filled with a 

 few hundred rough 

 wooden Pheasants, 

 which were nailed 

 upon the fir 

 branches, and at 

 night looked so 



exactly like the birds that the most practised eye could 

 not discover the difference. After these precautions had 

 been taken, the astute inventor was able to rest quietly 

 at home and chuckle to himself at the nocturnal reports 

 in the direction of the fir-wood. 



The nest of the Pheasant is a very rude attempt at 

 building, being merely a heap of leaves and grasses col- 

 lected together upon the ground, and with a very slight 

 depression, caused apparently quite as much by the 

 weight of the eggs as by the art of the bird. The eggs 

 are numerous, generally about eleven or twelve, and their 

 color is an uniform olive-brown. Their surface is very 

 smooth. When I was a boy I well remember finding a 

 Pheasant's nest in a copse, taking the whole clutch and 

 blowing them on the spot with perfect openness, being 

 happily ignorant of the penalties attached to such a pro- 

 ceeding, and not in the least acquainted with the risk 

 until I exhibited my prize to some friends, and saw their 

 horrified looks. 



The adult male Pheasant is a truly beautiful bird. 

 The head and neck are deep steely-blue, "shot" with 

 greenish-purple and brown ; and the sparkling hazel eye 

 is surrounded with a patch of bare scarlet skin, speckled profusely with blue-black. Over the 

 ears there is a patch of brown. The upper part of the back is beautifully adorned with light 

 golden-red feathers, each being tipped with deep black ; and the remainder of the back is of the 

 same golden-red, but marked with brown and a lighter tint of yellow without any admixture of 

 red. The quill-feathers of the wing are brown of several shades, and the long quills of the tail 



