BRITISH GAME-BIRDS. 199 



understand that the hedgerows and banks that 

 enclose those, also the tufty borders of the grazing 

 meadows, are to be included. Moor-partridges are 

 wild bred birds which have been brought out on 

 the moors, which are separated, in our southern 

 counties, only by a splashed bank from the corn- 

 fields. Having been hatched out on the moor, 

 they, together with old birds, naturally frequent 

 it; and they "jug" or squat closely together there 

 at night. The fields are visited certainly, but the 

 principal food -supply will be gleaned from their 

 wild hatching-out place ; and they fly farther and 

 run longer distances, also they are a little smaller 

 and darker, than those that keep to the corn and 

 the root lands entirely. The food they get on the 

 moors is in a great degree like that of the black- 

 cock and red grouse, and their flesh is naturally 

 darker than that of the other birds. The coveys 

 found on the moors are wilder also, and far more 

 gun - shy than are those of the lower grounds. 

 When they are on wing you can very often watch 

 them fly clean out of sight without dropping. 

 These little differences are all we have been able 

 to observe between the two ; and in the Surrey 



