Li BKWIUiKKMKNT. 



much ventilated in Scandinavia ; but as they mostly 

 occur during the breeding season, and seem confined to 

 males alone, it appears to be the general opinion, that 

 they arise from the senses of the bird being bewildered by 

 disappointed affections. " Love," says the late Rev. C. U. 

 Ekstrom,* " has the same effect on this bird as on many 

 other animals, and sometimes leads to acts that seem so 

 anomalous as to partake of madness; and when this 

 passion, which always obscures the faculties, is mixed up 

 with stupidity, the effect is more apparent. So it happens 

 with Pclle (the nickname of the Capercali) : when he is 

 driven from a harem, where a more powerful Pasha 

 than himself is ruling, he seeks his fortune in other quar- 

 ters ; and if the atmosphere at the time be misty, be often 

 pursues a wrong course, and as a consequence is met with 

 in places, where one would no more dream of seeing him 

 than of seeing an ostrich." 



The Capercali is of a pugnacious disposition. M . 

 Svederus tells us, that it is courageous " and has been 

 known to maintain long and bloody combats with the 

 eagle before becoming its prey ! " That it should strug- 

 gle violently when in the talons of " the king of the air," 

 I can well understand, ' but that it should maintain 



* A naturalist and sportsman of the very first order, combining (jiAlii ies 

 seldom found united in the same individual, and rendering his remarks 

 infinitely more valuable than those of the generality of mere eloset naturalists, 

 whose ehiet' olijeet -eems to be to split hairs and invent ~ pee ies lor their 

 own glori Heat ion. Well might Bishop PontoppidaB, when speaking of 

 them, and complaining of their having made out no fewer than thirty- 

 six kinds of thrushes, exclaim: " They give themsehes a particular deal 

 of trouble to find out the characteristie marks of each kind of liird in his 



generation ; yet I am of opinion that may, in this as in other (hiugs, 



multiply species without oeeasion, and thereby emifu.se one's ideas, instead 

 of clearing up or establishing them ; fm- bet w. ,-n v.nie ,,f them the dif- 

 ference is BO small, that I look upon it t.. >.e rather aeeidcntal than speeilie." 



