ia8 PARTRIDGE 



of a pair of Pheasants, the hen of which had been killed, 

 on the estate of of Colonel Burgoyne, in Essex. The hen 

 bird alone sits, the male keeping watch, and when the 

 young are hatched he joins the covey, and protects and 

 feeds them with the dam. 



The eggs, which are of a pale olive-brown colour 

 without markings, are laid towards the end of May or 

 the beginning of June ; pale blue or whitish varieties are 

 not unfrequent : they are usually ten or twelve in number, 

 but sometimes as many as fifteen, eighteen, or even twenty. 

 Twenty-two eggs are recorded to have been found in one 

 nest, and thirty-one in another, two hen birds having 

 occupied the same one ; and in the former instance the 

 cock bird gathered half of the united family under his 

 wings, the pair sitting side by side. In two other instances 

 thirty-three eggs are recorded as having been found in one 

 nest, but there is little doubt that they were contributed 

 by more than one bird. In one of these twenty-three young 

 were hatched and went off, and four of the other eggs 

 had live birds in them. The young leave the nest almost 

 as soon as they are hatched. Incubation lasts about twenty- 

 one days, beginning usually in June, about the 2Oth, as 

 has been stated, but no doubt generally earlier, especially 

 in the south, though often later in 1874, in February, 

 in Scotland. A Partridge's nest was found at Thistlewood, 

 Cumberland, containing seventeen Partridge's eggs and six 

 common Hen's eggs. The Partridge and the Hen were 

 sitting together upon the nest. 



"It is a curious fact," says Mr. Jesse, "that when 

 young Partridges are hatched and have left the nest, the 

 two portions of each shell will be found placed the one 

 within the other. I believe that this is invariably the 



