358 TETRAONID^E. 



cross the sea. In Scotland they are no more numerous in 

 winter than in summer, nor have they been observed to 

 take refuge in the woods. In the comparatively mild 

 temperature of Scotland there occurs no lengthened period 

 during which they cannot find their simple food somewhere 

 in the open country ; they consequently do not leave the 

 moors, but only descend lower. 



The Ptarmigan is neither so abundant nor so generally 

 diffused? in Scotland as the Grouse. It is said to have 

 existed at one time in the north of England and in Wales : 

 if so, it has totally disappeared, nor is it known in Ireland. 



THE COMiMON PARTKIDGE. 



PERDIX CINEREA. 



Face, eye-brows, and throat, blight rust-red ; behind the eye a naked red skin ; 

 neck, breast, and flanks, ash colour with black zigzag lines, and on the feathers 

 of the flanks a large rust-red spot ; low on the breast a chestnut patch shaped 

 like a horse-shoe ; upper parts ash-brown with black spots and zigzag lines ; 

 scapulars and wing-coverts darker; quills brown, barred and spotted with 

 yellowish red ; tail of eighteen feathers, the laterals bright rust-red ; beak 

 olive-brown ; feet grey. Female, less red on the face ; head spotted with 

 white ; upper plumage darker, spotted with black ; the horse -shoe mark 

 indistinct or wanting. Length thirteen inches. Eggs uniform olive-brown. 



VERY few, even of our common birds, are more generally 

 known than the Partridge. From the 1st of September 

 to the 1st of February, in large towns, every poulterer's 

 shop is pretty sure to be decorated with a goodly array of 

 these birds ; and there are few rural districts in which a 

 walk through the fields will fail to be enlivened by the 

 sudden rising and whirring away of a covey of Partridges, 

 in autumn and winter ; of a pair in spring. At mid- 

 summer they are of less frequent appearance, the female 

 being too busily occupied, either in incubation or the 

 training of her family, to find time for flight ; and at this 

 season, moreover, the uncut fields of hay, clover, and corn, 

 afford facilities for the avoiding of danger, by concealment 

 rather than by flight. The habits of the Partridge, as of 

 the Grouse, are especially terrestrial. It never flies, like 



