WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS 



The partridges here are chiefly hatched about the last 

 weekinjune. Like the landrail, the hen bird sits very close, 

 and during that time willaimost allow herself to be taken 

 up inthe hand, especially when near theirtime of hatching. 

 They seem to be quite confident in the forbearance of my 

 boys, who have an intimate acquaintance with almostevery 

 nest in the neighbourhood of the house, the old bird allow- 

 ing them to peer closely into her nest, and even to move 

 aside the grass and herbage which conceal it, when they 

 want to see if she is on her eggs. A retriever one day caught 

 an old hen partridge on her nest,but let her go again on my 

 rating him, without doing more damage to her than pulling 

 out somefeathers.Notwithstandingthis she returned to the 

 nest, and hatched the whole of the eggs the next day. Had 

 she not been so near her time of hatching, I do not suppose 

 that she would have returned again. 



All birds have the same instinctive foreknowledge of the 

 time of hatching being near at hand, and do not, when this 

 is the case, leave their nest so easily as when disturbed at 

 an earlier period of incubation. Some small birds are much 

 tamer in this respect than others. A bullfinch will often allow 

 herself to be taken off her nest, and replaced again, without 

 showing the least symptom of fear. Indeed, this bird if put 

 into a cage with her nest of young ones will continue to feed 

 them as readily as if her habitation was still in its original 

 situation. Blackbirds are also very unwilling to fly oft'' from 

 their eggs.The common wren,on the contrary, immediately 

 forsakes her nest if it is at all handled and examined before 

 she has laid her eggs. She will abandon it if she merely ob- 

 serves people looking too closely at it; but when she has 



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