292 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. 



with metallic purple or green margins ; feathers of the mantle 

 and sides of the breast and flanks chestnut, with black centres 

 and pinkish-grey margins ; an elongated patch of white black- 

 tipped feathers below the eyes ; quills more coarsely barred and 

 mottled with buff than in the male ; tail-feathers reddish-brown 

 down the middle, shading into sandy-olive on the sides and 

 with wide irregular triple bars of black, buff, and black. Total 

 length, 24-5 inches; wing, 8*6; tail, 11-5 ; tarsus, 2-4. 



Range. The Common Pheasant has been introduced in 

 most parts of Europe, with the exception of Spain and 

 Portugal, and the higher latitudes of Scandinavia and Russia. 

 For this reason it is difficult, if not impossible, to state 

 accurately the limits of its true home. It appears, however, to 

 be found in a wild state in Southern Turkey, Greece, and Asia 

 Minor as far east as Transcaucasia, and it extends northwards 

 to the Volga. On the Island of Corsica it is also met with in 

 a wild state, and may have been imported at some remote 

 period ; but if it is really indigenous there, its range must formerly 

 have extended much farther west than the counties mentioned 

 above. 



There is no record, as far as we know, of its importation to 

 the British Islands, but it is mentioned in the bills-of-fare of 

 the last Saxon king. 



Habits. The favourite home of the Pheasant is thick covert, 

 woods with plenty of undergrowth, in the immediate neighbour- 

 hood of cultivated land, where in the morning and evening the 

 birds can come out to feed. Oak, hazel, and fir plantations 

 scattered over large parks are much resorted to, for the birds 

 seldom stray far from the shelter of the trees, and retire on 

 the slightest approach of danger, being decidedly shy and 

 retiring in their habits. 



Most of our readers are well acquainted with the Common 

 Pheasant in a semi-domesticated state, when it is undoubtedly 

 polygamous, one -male pairing with many females, but there 

 seems to be good reason for believing that this habit has been 

 acquired ; for, in a really wild state, all the evidence, though it 

 is certainly somewhat scanty, tends to show that this, as well 

 as the other species of Phasianus, is monogamous, the cock 

 bird remaining with the female during the period of incubation, 



