96 PHASIANID.E. 



'Household Book' of the fifth Earl of Northumherland (1512), 

 and from the time of the Tudor monarchs, Pheasants are 

 specified with Partridges in the statutes for the protection of 

 game. 



In Scotland, according to Mr. R. Gray,* the first mention 

 of the Pheasant occurs in an Act dated June 8, 1594, in the 

 reign of James VI., a great protector of all kinds of game. 

 In the aforesaid year he " ordained that quhatsumever person 

 or persones at ony time hereafter sail happen to slay deir, 

 harts, phesants, foulls, partricks, or uther wyld foule quhat- 

 sumever, ather with gun, crace bow, dogges, halks, or girnes, 

 or be uther ingine quhatsumever, or that beis found schutting 

 with ony gun therein," &c., &c., shall pay the usual " hun- 

 dreth punds," &c. It is now generally distributed in suit- 

 able localities from Sutherland to Wigtownshire, and in the 

 neighbourhood of Loch Lomond it is occasionally seen on 

 the mountain-sides as far up as 1,200 feet. Introduced into 

 Lewis in the Outer Hebrides about fifteen years ago by Sir 

 James Matheson, it has become fairly established there, as 

 well as in Islay, where it grows to a large size. The east 

 side of Scotland does not, as a rule, appear to be so well 

 suited to it, but it has thriven in the coverts near Banff 

 belonging to the Earl of Fife. 



As regards Ireland, the date of its introduction is unknown. 

 Giraldus Cambrensis, in his * Topographia Hibernica ' (a.d. 

 1183-1186), expressly states that in his day there were 

 neither Pheasants nor Partridges ; and Ranulphus Higden, 

 who died at an advanced age about 1363, mentions in his 

 ' Polychronicon,' 'j)erdices' and ' phasiani ' as being absent 

 from Ireland, f About two centuries later, in * A Brife 

 Description of Ireland made in the yeere 1589 by Robert 

 Payne,' is the following: — " There be great store of wild 

 swannes, cranes, 'phesantes, partriges, heathcocks, plouers 

 greene and gray, curlewes, woodcockes, rayles, quailes, and 

 all other fowles much more plentifull than in England." 

 Fynes Moryson, who was in Ireland from 1599 till 1603, 



* Birds of the West of Scotland, p. 226. 

 t Harting, 'Zool.' 1881, pp. 437 and 439. 



