4 GAME BIRDS AND WILD FOWL. 



the soil, so that the field is intersected from one 

 end to the other by straight narrow alleys, along 

 which the birds run with extraordinary speed; 

 and instead of finding them well scattered at or 

 near the spot where they were marked down as 

 was the case when the old broadcast style of 

 sowing was in vogue he has the mortification 

 of seeing them far out of shot, topping a gate in 

 a compact body, and may thank his stars if their 

 next flight should happen to be into a patch of 

 clover or standing oats. 



But although the common partridge may thus 

 be said to follow in the steps of civilized man, and 

 to be attracted by the labours of the agriculturist, 

 still there is scarcely an instance * of its having 

 ever bred in captivity, while the experiment has 

 frequently proved successful with the red-legged 

 species, as well as with grouse and black game ; 

 and yet, individually, the bird is eminently sus- 

 ceptible of domestication in confinement, and has 

 been known to evince the strongest personal 

 attachment to its owner. A lady in West Sussex 

 had a tame partridge for many years : it was a 



* a There is but one record, as far as I am aware, of the 

 partridge breeding in confinement. Sir Thomas Marion 

 Wilson, Bart., had a small covey of seven or eight hatched 

 and reared by the parent birds in his aviary at Charlton in the 

 summer of 1842. I saw these birds in 1843." Yarrell's 

 ' Hist, of British Birds,' second edition. 



