BIRD ADVENTURERS 213 



With us eggs were found in Yorkshire and 

 young birds in Morayshire, on open barren 

 ground, and if you live near such country you 

 may any year have the luck to come across a 

 young sand-grouse. If you do, you will know 

 it from a young partridge by the feet, which 

 have only three toes, and those so short and 

 wide, and so covered with down, that the foot 

 looks more like the paw of some little beast 

 than the foot of a bird. But for all their 

 persevering attempts to settle in unknown 

 countries, the sand-grouse have not succeeded 

 in living anywhere in Europe further west 

 than Russia. In our part of the world no 

 doubt the wet climate was what they could 

 not stand ; even in summer we get so much 

 wet, that short-legged birds like these, always 

 living and looking for food on the ground, 

 cannot help getting draggled and chilled. 

 Perhaps, later on, they may succeed better, 

 and get used to the climate by degrees, for in 

 all kinds of creatures you will find some which 

 will bear heat or cold or damp better than 

 others ; and any sand-grouse which are found 

 to be able to live on a damp soil will soon 

 increase and multiply, for fortunately a law 



