STRUCTURE, FOOD, AND HABITS. 21 



friends, to decide a wager of which I was myself the loser." 

 On November 12, 1897, a cock was shot at Pluckley, in Kent, 

 which weighed four and a half pounds. One of five pounds 

 and half an ounce was sent me by Mr. Carr, of the Strand ; 

 this was a last year's bird of the common species. And 

 in 1859 one bird, of the enormous weight of five pounds and 

 three-quarters, was sent by Mr. Akroyd, of Boddington 

 Pai'k, Nantwich, to Mr. Shaw, of Shrewsbury, for preserva- 

 tion. Mr. Akroyd further stated that " the bird was picked 

 up with broken leg and wing forty-eight hours after the 

 covert was shot, so had probably lost weight to some extent." 

 In reply to the suggestion that it might possibly have been a 

 large hybrid between the pheasant and the domestic fowl, 

 Mr. Akroyd further stated '^that the bird looked all its 

 weight, and was as distinguished amongst its fellows as a 

 turkey would be amongst fowls; yet it had no hybrid 

 appearance whatever " ; and Mr. Shaw stated that he 

 weighed it several times. Moreover, he said, ''the bird, had 

 it been picked up when shot, would, I have little doubt, have 

 weighed six pounds, there being nothing in its craw but two 

 single grains of Indian corn ; and when the length of time it 

 remained wounded on the ground, with a broken thigh and 

 wing, is taken into consideration, there can be little doubt of 

 the fact.^' But the largest on record was described in 

 vol. xlvi., p. 179, of The Field. G. C. G. writes: "I have 

 received the following from Mr. Kelly in consequence of a 

 discussion in The Field about the weight of a pheasant : 

 ' Some few years since, while Admiral Sir Houston Stewart 

 was residing at Ganton, he sent me a pheasant that weighed 

 61b. wanting loz. He was an old bird, and the most splendid 

 in form and plumage that I ever beheld. A few days after- 

 wards being at Ganton, I told Sir Houston that I had 

 weighed the bird, but I thought my weights must be 

 incorrect, and asked him whether he knew its weight. He 

 said, " You are quite right. I weighed it before I sent it to 

 you, and that is my weight." ' " In these cases of exceptionally 



