THE PHEASANT 



The pheasant is in many respects a very 

 curious bird. At the threshold of life, it 

 exhibits, in common with some of its near 

 relations, a precocity very unusual in ite 

 class ; and the readiness with which pheasant 

 chicks, only just out of the egg, run about 

 and forage for themselves, is astonishing to 

 those unused to it. Another interesting 

 feature about pheasants is the extraordinary 

 difference in plumage between the sexes, a 

 gap equalled only between the blackcock 

 and greyhen and quite unknown in the 

 partridge, quail and grouse. Yet every now 

 and again, as if resentful of this inequality 

 of wardrobe, an old hen pheasant will assume 

 male plumage, and this epicene raiment 

 indicates barrenness. Ungallant feminists 

 have been known to cite the case of the 

 " mule " pheasant as pointing a moral for the 

 females of a more highly organised animal. 



The question of the pheasant's natural 

 diet, more particularly where this is not 

 liberally supplemented from artificial sources, 

 brings the sportsman in conflict with the 

 farmer, and a demagogue whose zeal 

 occasionally outruns his discretion has even 

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