mn THE BIRD WATCHER 
life and death. I renfmber once passing unusually 
close to a cock pheasant, which remained crouching 
all the while, though nineteen out of twenty birds 
would, I feel sure, have gone up. It struck me, 
then, that as all such pheasants as acted in this way 
would have a greater chance of not being shot than 
the others that rose more easily, whilst these latter 
were constantly being killed off, therefore, in course 
of time, the habit of crouching close ought to become 
more and more developed, and pheasants, in conse- 
quence, more and more difficult to shoot. Some time 
afterwards I met with some independent evidence that 
this was the case, for a gentleman who shot much in 
Norfolk, remarked, without any previous conversa- 
tion on the subject, that the pheasants there had 
taken to refusing to rise, and that this unsportsman- 
like conduct on their part was giving great trouble 
and causing general dissatisfaction. That was his 
statement. He spoke of it as something that had 
lately become more noticeable, but only, as far as his 
knowledge went, in Norfolk, which, I believe, is an 
extremely murderous county. 
Beyond this I have no knowledge on the subject, 
but I feel sure that a gradual process of change and 
differentiation is every day going on amongst numbers 
of our British birds. I believe that I have myself, 
here and there, seen some traces of it, and my idea is 
that greater pains ought to be taken to collect evidence 
in this and similar directions. Along all those lines 
where fluctuation has been observed, or where modi- 
