118 BIED LIFE IN ENGLAND. 



AMONG THE BLACKCOCK. 



Why Blackcock enjoy exemption from the dread disease 

 which ever and anon carries off their near relatives, the red 

 grouse, sends down the rents of highland shooting, clipping 

 the expenditure of the lairds, and influencing the finances 

 of one-half of the British isles, can only be determined when 

 the true nature of the malady is better understood. But 

 many things favour a long and happy life to these birds. 

 Their food is various ; frost-bitten heather in the spring 

 matters little to them ; from the time the snow melts on the 

 mountain tops to the period of its coming again, their bill 

 of fare is ample and full thus they are placed beyond the 

 reach of hard times and sickness-bringing scarcity. Then 

 their powerful bodies and large size must modify the courage 

 of attacking hawks, giving them little " stomach for the 

 fight," the same cause doubtless repelling the attacks of the 

 marauding hill crows and ground vermin, who think twice 

 before robbing the nest of so stoutly made a bird as the 

 watchful and courageous grey-hen. Lastly, it might be 

 suggested that the freer flight and less gregarious habits of 

 the moor-fowl save them from what is probably the most 

 pregnant cause of grouse disease, the overstocking of estates. 



This preamble, however, is merely to introduce the fact 

 that, disappointed with the grouse last season, and yet bent 

 upon getting something in the way of sport out of our ten 

 thousand acres, I turned my attention, directly the 20th of 

 August gave lawful sanction, to the " grouse of the second 

 degree." Let me place before you the surroundings of 

 myself and another equally ardent "gun" on the eve of 

 that long-looked-for date. No palatial shooting-lodge this 

 time. A scorn of rheumatism and a taste for roughing it 

 had determined us to take time by the forelock, and to 

 march out into the enemy's country over night and camp 



