OF HARTING. 287 



resources, notwithstanding the great abundance of the 

 wire worm, which, besides many other insect-enemies 

 to the farmer, it destroys in great numbers ; we pass 

 on then to the Red-legged or French Partridge (Perdix 

 rubra). In the year 1776, the late Sir Henry Fether- 

 stonhaugh imported from France several sittings of 

 the eggs of Perdix rufa ; and in the subsequent cor- 

 respondence between him and his mother, we learn 

 that the hatching was perfectly successful, several 

 coveys were bred in the walled gardens attached to 

 " Harting Place" and in the park ; but the experiment 

 to establish them here permanently appears to have 

 failed. We have a recollection of some forty years, 

 during which we never heard of a single specimen 

 having been found on the estate ; and when, about 

 the year 1860, one of the keepers discovered several 

 eggs of the species on Castle Farm, he brought them 

 to us as the eggs of " some furrin bird," the like 

 of which he had never seen before. Since then we 

 have not only met with several in the warren and on 

 East Harting farm (some deposited in nests of the 

 pheasant), but many of the birds have been shot on 

 East Harting down, where it has been no uncommon 

 occurrence to put up a covey or two several seasons in 

 succession. The species is said to be tolerably com- 

 mon in the neighbourhood of Butser Hill, but a 

 gentleman who occupies land there, does not speak 

 favourably of the sport it affords, or of its claim to a 

 high rank among the delicacies of the table ; on the 

 contrary, it is within the bounds of probability that he 

 never misses an opportunity of emphatically putting 

 his foot on a French Partridge's egg when he finds 

 one. 



The common Partridge (Perdix cinerea) in favour- 

 able seasons is sufficiently numerous in the stubbles, 

 the clover and the turnips, to constitute what the 

 keepers term "a pretty fair sprinkling;" but as a rule 



