TETRAONID^ — THE GROUSE. 



433 



doubt the most southern point at which it has been discovered. Dr. Coues 

 has never met with it in Arizona. 



Mr. Eidgway encountered it everywhere in the Great Basin where there 

 was a thrifty growth of the artemisia, whicli appears everywhere to regu- 

 late its existence. He corroborates the accounts given of its heavy, lumber- 

 ing fliglit ; and when it has once escaped, it flies so far that the sportsman 

 rarely has a second opportunity to Hush it. It rises apparently with great 

 effort. He was told bv the settlers of Nevada and Utah that the Sage-Hen 

 was never known to touch grain of any kind, even when found in the 

 vicinity of grain-fields. This is attributed to a very curious anatomical 

 peculiarity of the species, — the entire absence of a gizzard ; having instead 

 a soft membranous stomach, rendering it impossible to digest any hard food. 

 In a large number of specimens dissected, nothing was found but grass- 

 hoppers and leaves of the artemisia. 



Two eggs in my cabinet, from Utah, measure, one 2.20 by 1.50 inches, and 

 the other 2.15 by 1.45. They are of an elongate-oval shape, slightly pointed^ 

 at one end. Their ground-color varies from a light-greenish drab to a drab 

 shaded with buff They are thickly freckled with small rounded spots of 

 reddish-brown and dark chestnut. 



Genus PEDICECETES, Baird. 



Pedicecetes, Baird, Birds N. Am. 1858, 625. (Type, Tctrao j^hasianellus, Linn.) 



Gen. Char. Tail short, graduated ; exclusive of the much lengthened middle part, 

 where are two feathers (perhaps tail-coverts) with parallel edges and truncated ends 



Pediaecetes phasianellus. 



half the full rounded wing. Tarsi densely feathered to the toes and between their bases. 

 Neck without peculiar feathers. Culmen between the Tiasal fossae not half the total length, 

 VOL. III. 55 



