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3888 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 
years ago, one of his sons found a Grouse’s nest with fifteen eggs, 
which he brought home, and immediately placed beneath a hen then 
sitting, taking away her own. The nest of the Grouse was on the 
ground, under a tussock of long grass, formed with very little art, 
and few materials: the eggs were brownish-white, and about the 
size of a pullet’s. In three or four days, the whole were hatched. 
Instead of following the hen, they compelled her to run after them, 
distracting her with the extent and diversity of their wanderings ; 
and it was a day or two before they seemed to understand her 
language, or consent to be guided by her. ‘They were let out to 
the fields, where they paid little regard to their nurse; and, in a 
few days, only three of them remained. ‘These became extremely 
tame and familiar, were most expert flycatchers; but, soon after, 
they also disappeared. 
The eggs of this species are generally ovoidal in form, 
and are often pretty sharply tapered at their small ends. 
They vary in color from a dirty-drab to a grayish-white, and 
are covered more or less thickly with fine spots or dots of 
brown: some specimens have none of these markings, while 
others are abundantly spotted. A large number of speci- 
mens in my collection average about 1.80 by 1.25 inch in 
dimensions. 
BONASA, STEPHENS. 
Bonasa, STEPHENS, Shaw’s Gen. Zool., XI. (1819). (Type Tetrao bonasia, L.) 
Tail widening to the end, its feathers very broad, as long as the wings; the 
feathers soft, and eighteen in number; tarsi naked in the lower half; covered with 
two rows of hexagonal scales anteriorly, as in the Ortygine; sides of toes strongly 
pectinated; naked space on the side of throat covered by a tuft of broad soft feathers ; 
portion of culmen between the nasal fosse about one-third the total length; top of 
head with a soft crest. 
BONASA UMBELLUS. — Stephens. 
The Ruffed Grouse; Partridge; Pheasant. 
Tetrao umbellus, Linneus. Syst. Nat., I. (1766) 275. Wils. Am. Orn., VI. 
(1812) 46. Aud. Orn. Biog., I. (1831) 211; V. 560. 
Tetiao (Bonasia) wmbellus, Bonaparte. Syn. (1828), 126. Nutt. Man., I. (1832) 
657. 
Bonasa umbellus, Stephens. Shaw, Gen. Zool., XI. (1824) 300. 
