792 MANUAL OF MODERN FARRIERY. 



ing in the adjoining fields commences at dawn : and also 

 before retiring to rest, about sunset. It seldom flies to these 

 feeding haunts, but runs to them, and hence the ease with 

 which thej are snared bj poachers, who set wire-snares in 

 the narrow paths that the birds make through the long grass, 

 as they invariably go and return by the same route. Its 

 habit of roosting on trees is still more fatal to this bird, 

 since, from being an object of considerable size, readily to be 

 distinguished also by its long tail, and at the same time not 

 easily frightened from its perch, it offers a sure mark during 

 moonlight nights to the gun of the poacher ; and it is chiefly 

 from this mode of destruction that such incredible numbers 

 are sent to the London markets, in defiance of the enact- 

 ments of the game-laws. 



The short crow of the males may be heard in March, and 

 being polygamous, they take possession of certain beats, and, 

 each maintaining his own chosen resort, drives all other 

 males from it, in contesting for which severe battles ensue. 

 In this, his chosen resort, each bird commences crowing, 

 accompanied by a peculiar clapping of the wings, and which 

 answers as the note of invitation to the other sex as well as 

 of defiance to his own. 



The female makes a rude nest upon the ground, in which 

 she deposits from ten to fourteen eggs, of a clear olive-green 

 colour. The young are hatched during the months of June 

 and July, and continue under the protection of the female 

 parent until their first moult, and assume the adult plumage, 

 which, commencing about the beginning of September, is 

 perfected by the middle of the following month, and after 

 this period the young males are only to be distinguished 

 from the older birds by the comparative shortness and blunt- 

 ness of the tarsal spur. 



The principal food of the pheasant, in the winter months. 



