

The Red Grouse Natural History. 103 



in all parts of the British Isles. In England it prevails to 

 more or less extent on the moors of the four northern 

 counties of Lancashire, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, sparsely in 

 Staffordshire, and in appreciable extent in other counties. 

 In the mountainous parts of Wales it is also a staple bird 

 of sport, as also on most of the great Irish moorlands ; but 

 nowhere is it so abundant as in Scotland, particularly 

 in the north or the highlands, and in the large islands 

 generally on the western coast. 



The reason of this abundance is not far to seek. The 

 grouse is emphatically a denizen of the moor, and it is, 

 moreover, a thoroughly wild bird, which, although amenable 

 to domestication to some extent, brooks no intrusion either 

 by man or beast, upon the uncultivated, unfrequented, almost 

 desolate lands which are its sole habitat. Wherever the 

 improving hand of man encroaches, the moorcock flies 

 before him. It is not because the heather-covered lands 

 of Aberdeenshire, of Sutherlandshire, and elsewhere, possess 

 inherent peculiarities that they become acceptable to the 

 grouse ; it is because sheep, shepherds, and sheepdogs do not 

 daily scour them, because the heather is not burned to make 

 way for the growth of pasture, and because the many other 

 conditions are not present which mark the progress of 

 agriculture. Hence it is that we must journey to Yorkshire, 

 to Cumberland, or to the Highlands before the I2th August, 

 and learn, for the most part, the secret of successful grouse- 

 preserving. The grouse seems to have little preference as 

 regards the nature of a given moor, provided its haunts 

 be sufficiently free from intrusion, and present the well- 

 known characteristics of abundant heather and dry waste 



