414 PEDKECETES PHASIANELLUS VAR. COLUMBIANUS. 



at eacli step. We will not combine murder Mith the robbery we are 

 about to commit, and let us hope she will be consoled iu time. Litling 

 up the e^gs carefully, one by one, we find the nest to be merely a few 

 spears of grass, pressed down and somewhat circularly arranged with, 

 in ;t11 ])robability, a few feathers that appear to ha\e rather been me- 

 chanically detached from the mother bird than laid down by design. If 

 the place is near our northern border, and early iu June, we shall i)rob- 

 ably Hnd the eggs quiie fresh ; but by the third week of that month 

 they will be about hatching. At this period should we, for any sufti- 

 cient reason, destroy the setting bird, we should find her in sad plight — 

 her plumage, harsh and worn, entirely gone from a large space on her 

 belly; her iiesh thin and flabby, and her crop containing only a few- 

 buds of some weed that grows close by her nest, with some grasshop- 

 pers or other insects. 



No bird is a more faitliful mother than this Grouse; no on*^ clings to 

 her eggs more steadfastly, or guards her young with more sedulous care. 

 In proof of how close she will set while incubating, let me mention two 

 instances that came under my observation. One poor bird was actually 

 trodden upon and killed, and some of her eggs smashed. On another 

 occasion, I drove a large four-mule ambulance over a nest; the animals 

 shied as they stepped over it, when the bird fluttered out from between 

 their legs. Stopping instantly, I discovered the nest just between the 

 hinder wheels. The Grouse lies hard and close, never relinquishing 

 hope of escaping observation until the last moment. 



The young, as usual among gallinaceous birds, run about almost as 

 soon as they are hatched; and it is interesting to witness the watchful 

 solicitude with which they are cherished by the parent when she first 

 leads them from the nest in quest of food, glancing in every direction, 

 in her intense anxiety, list harm befall them. She clucks matronly to 

 bring them to brood uuder her wings, or to call them together to scram- 

 ble for a choice morsel of food she has found. Should danger threaten, a 

 different note alarms them; they scatter iu every direction, running, like 

 little mice, through the grass till each finds a biding place; meanwhile, 

 she exposes herself to attract attention, till, satisfied of the safety of the 

 brood, she whirrs away and awaits the time when she may reassemble 

 her family. In the region where I observed the birds in June and July, 

 they almost invariably betook themselves to the dense, resistent under- 

 brush, which extends for some distance outward from the wooded 

 streams, seeking safety in this all but impenetrable cover, where it was 

 nearly impossible to catch the young ones, or even to see them, until 

 they began to top the bushes in their early short flights. The wing and 

 tail-feathers sprout iu a few days, and are quite well grown before 

 feathers appear among the down of the body. The first coveys seen 

 able to rise on Aving were noticed early in July; but by the middle of this 

 month most of them fly smartly for short distances, being about as large 

 as Quails. Others, however, may be observed through August, little, if 

 any, larger than this, showing a wide range of time of hatching, though 

 scarcely warranting the inference of two broods iu a season. 



Eeturning to the newly-hatched chicks, we will note their character- 

 istics as they ])rogress toward maturity. The down in which they are 

 clothed when hatched is rather dingy yellow, mottled on the crown, back, 

 and wings with warm brown and black; it extends to the toes, but leaves 

 a bare s'trij) along the hind edge of the tarsus; the bill and feet are light 

 brown. They are about as large as Bantam chickens of the same age, and 

 very pretty little things, indeed. They are very quick in their movemeuts, 

 scrambling to squat and hide, on the least alarm, even at this early age. 



