182 LAGOPUS SCOTICUS. 



bable it may appear, I am certain they carry the eggs from a 

 great distance to their young, and a nourishing treat they no 

 doubt are to them. No creature can be more dihgent for the 

 attainment of any object than these merciless phmderers are 

 for the discovery of the moor-fowls' nests. They watch and 

 listen on the heaths all the time the Grouse are hatching ; for 

 you must know that every now and then, especially about the 

 time when the young perforate the shells, there is a tender or 

 motherly chuckle emitted by the hen. This sound is a signal 

 for a search near the place from whence the sound proceeded. 

 Another leads them to the very point, when a desj)erate battle 

 ensues. But two moor-fowls are not a match for a single crow% 

 especially wdien stung with hunger herself, or when she knows 

 her own young are clamorous at home for food ; and when she 

 gets the mastery, the scene is truly pitiable. The embryos 

 swimming in their native fluid are torn out of the shells, and 

 swallowed at a single gobble by the greedy hoddy, or carried 

 off to her young. I have often relieved the poor moor-fowl, 

 though I knew it was only to prolong her sufferings. The 

 Carrion Crow^ no doubt persecutes and destroys the young grouse 

 until grown, but when the latter gets fairly to the wing, it is 

 no longer in danger. The Grouse sit very close among the 

 heath in a den rounded by art, in which they certainly con- 

 tinue a long time, for often there will be a dozen of separate 

 pieces of their excrement left, sometimes many more. When 

 snow" storms are on the hills, they congregate to the number of 

 sixty or a hundred in a flock, but disperse as soon as the snow 

 melts away. They live in great terror of the Goshaw^k (Pere- 

 grine Falcon), and indeed he is their most deadly enemy, scarcely 

 living on anything else, and seldom missing his quarry after fix- 

 ing on it. He either trusses it in the air, or drives it to the 

 ground, and then kills it. I once saw this strong hawk carrying 

 what I took to be a moor-fowd in his talons. A wing of the dead 

 bird was hanging down. Some ravens and two or three hawks 

 were diving at him in the air. Annoyed by them, he allowed the 

 grouse to slip out of his grasp ; but it had not descended many 

 yards, when he dived after it with great rapidity, trussed it 

 again far from the ground, and flew off with it. I have often 



