THE RUFFED GROUSE. 389 



DESCRIPTION. 



Tail of eighteen feathers, reddish-brown or gray above ; the back with cordate 

 spots of lighter ; beneath whitish, transversely barred with dull-brown ; tail tipped 

 with gray, and with a subterminal bar of black ; broad feathers of the ruff black. 



Tail lengthened, nearly as long as the wing ; very broad, and moderately 

 rounded ; the feathers very broad and truncate, the tip slightly convex, eighteen in 

 number; upper half of tarsus only feathered; bare behind and below, with two 

 rows of hexagonal scutellae anteriorly; a naked space on the side of the neck, con- 

 cealed by an overhanging tuft of broad, truncate feathers ; there are no pectinated 

 processes above the eye, where the skin instead is clothed with short feathers. 



Length, eighteen inches; wing, seven and twenty one-hundredths ; tail, seven 

 inches. 



This beautiful and well-known bird, commonly, but very 

 improperly, called Partridge, is a general resident in all the 

 New-England States throughout the year. In the most 

 retired localities, and in the near vicinage of towns, it is 

 found almost equally abundant ; and its habits and charac- 

 teristics are the same in all localities, except that in thickly 

 settled districts, in consequence of its being more pursued 

 by sportsmen, it is much wilder and more difficult of ap- 

 proach than in less settled neighborhoods. So tame and 

 unsuspicious are these birds in the deep forests, that I have 

 had considerable difficulty at times in flushing them. When 

 I have approached them, instead of flying off, as they should, 

 they stood watching me like so many barn-yard fowls ; and 

 when I walked up to within a few feet of them, to get them 

 a-wing, for no true sportsman will ever kill a game bird 

 unless it is flying, they only retreated slowly into a thicket 

 of undergrowth, and remained there until actually forced to 

 take flight. 



About the first of May, sometimes a little earlier, more 

 often later, the female withdraws from the society of the 

 male, and repairs to a retired spot in the woods, where, 

 usually beneath a thicket of evergreen, or a bunch of brush, 

 or perhaps a fallen log or rock, she scrapes together a few 

 leaves into a loose nest, and deposits from eight to twelve 

 eggs. These are usually of a yellowish-white, sometimes 

 a darker color, sometimes nearly pure-white. They are 



