394 GUACHARO 



throughout Scotland, though not in Orkney, Shetland, or the Outer 

 Hebrides, nor in Ireland. On the continent of Europe it has a 

 very wide range, and it extends into Siberia. In Georgia its place 

 is taken by a distinct species, on which a Polish naturalist {Proc. 

 Zool. Soc. 1875, p. 267) has unhappily conferred the name of T. 

 mlokosiewiczi. Both these birds have much in common with their 

 larger congeners the Capercally and its eastern representative. 



We must then notice the species of the genus Bonasa, of which 

 the European B. sylvestris, the Hazel-hen, is the type. This does 

 not inhabit the British Islands ; unfortunately so, for it is perhaps 

 the most delicate game-bird that comes to table. It is the Gelinotte 

 of the French, the Haselhulm of Germans, and Rjerpe of Scandi- 

 navians. Like its transatlantic congener B. umbellus, the Huffed 

 Grouse or Birch-Partridge (of which there are three other local 

 forms, B. togata, B. umhelloides, and B. sabinii), it is purely a forest- 

 bird. The same may be said of the species of Canachites, of which 

 tAvo forms are found in America, C. canadensis, the Spruce-Partridge, 

 and C franklini, and also of the Siberian C. fakipennis. Nearly 

 allied to these birds is the group known as JDendragapus, containing 

 three large and fine forms, D. ohscurus, D. fiiliginosus, and D. 

 richardsoni — all peculiar to North America. Then we have Cen- 

 trocercus urophasianus, the Sage-cock of the plains of Columbia and 

 California, and Fediocxtes, the Sharp-tailed Grouse, with its three 

 forms, P. phasianellns, P. columbianus, and P. campestris, while finally 

 Tympanuclms, the Prairie-hen, also with three local forms, T. cupido, 

 now nearly extinct, T. americamis, and T. pallidicindns, is a bird that 

 in the United States of America possesses considerable economic 

 value, as \Wtness the enormous numbers that are not only consumed 

 there, but exported to Europe. It will be seen that the great 

 majority of Grouse belong to the northern part of the New World, 

 and it is to be regretted that space here fails to do justice to these 

 beautiful and important birds^ by enlarging on their interesting 

 distinctions. They are nearly all figured in Mr. Elliot's Monograph 

 of the Tetraonin8S, and an excellent account of the American species, 

 so far as then known, is given in Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway's 

 North American Birds (iii. pp. 414-465), while the Manual of the 

 last of these authors concisely notices the forms lately recognized. 



GUACHARO,^ the Spanish-American name of what English 

 writers have lately taken to calling the Oil-Bird, the Steatornis 

 caripensis of ornithologists, a very remarkable bird, first described 

 by Alexander von Humboldt (Journ. de Physique, liii. p. 57 ; Foy. 

 aux ESg. ^quinoxiales, i. p. 413, Engl, transl. iii. p. 119; Obs. 

 Zoologie, ii. p. 141, pi. xliv.) from his own observation and from 



^ This is said to be an obsolete Spanish word signifying one that cries, 

 moans, or laments loudly. 



