FLIGHT OF THE GALLING. 129 



find their food there. They are ground birds ; and 

 only cull the seeds of those herbaceous plants which 

 they can reach when standing, and gather such other 

 seeds, insects, worms, and various succulent or fari- 

 naceous vegetable substances, or often animal ones 

 (for some of the genera are not very particular in that 

 respect) as they find on the surface, but scrape up 

 the rubbish with their feet, in search of such sub- 

 stances suited to their taste, as may be found under it. 

 The march of the males is stately, and they are often 

 very gay with ornamental plumage peculiar to their 

 sex. They are all, however, heavy and laborious 

 fliers ; and make but little use of their wings, except 

 when alarmed, or in reaching those perches upon 

 which they pass the night secure from the attacks of 

 foxes and other predatory mammalia which hunt 

 during the night but do not climb. 



Ptarmigan, 



The flight of the gallinidae is so peculiar, that it 

 might be taken as their descriptive character, with 

 fully as much propriety as any other action is of a 

 division of birds ; and certainly with more than 

 climbing can be as characteristic of the last order. 

 The domestic cock, for instance, is quite a soldier in 

 his wars ; and like a gallant soldier (and he himself 

 is the type of pugnacious gallantry as well as the 

 original of the name) he fights for the honour of the 

 victory, and not, like a mercenary, for pay and " pro- 

 vend." When he leads forth the dames of his seraglio 



