no Practical Game Preserving. 



fashion, the deaths of thousands of young grouse or 

 "cheepers." Moorlands at any time are not the least 

 rainy parts of the country, and when for five or six days 

 in succession the deluge is repeated, they become neither the 

 driest or the cosiest of outdoor habitations. On unsuitable 

 moors, or those which by reason of their nature or situation 

 are unable to run off the surplus water quickly, the ground 

 becomes soddened, every little depression becomes a pool, 

 and every gust of wind scoops the water out of the holes 

 and flings it over the upstanding tufts and expanses, so that 

 the grouse of mature age are hard pressed for shelter, while 

 the young of all ages and sizes find it terrible work to with- 

 stand the wet, and in bad places go down before it in tens 

 and hundreds. The necessity, therefore, of choosing a quickly 

 draining moor is evident to the most inexperienced. The 

 essential character of a moor may be said to consist in its 

 unevenness of surface. A very slightly undulating expanse 

 of closely heathered land is rarely so much affected by 

 the birds as one abounding in abrupt irregularities, a good 

 "up-and-down sort of place," in fact, where the projecting 

 granite stones are found in clusters, surrounded by luxuriant 

 growth of moor-plant, and where the brooks and burns are 

 plentiful. In the more frequented and cultivated districts a 

 belt of plantation, old or young, between the parts frequented 

 by genus homo, and the domain of the tetrao, is not only a 

 great advantage but an allurement to the birds, although 

 they are not given to frequent wooded land. 



Another very important matter is the surroundings of a 

 proposed grouse moor. It may be very well to acquire a 

 tract of land, and say you are going to rear grouse, &c. ; 



