FEATHERED FRAUDS. 127 



there from the ground all round me, without being 

 able to see a bird, no matter how closely I 

 scrutinised every foot of sand. Then the Sand 

 Grouse, and the Coursers, and the Bustards are 

 all guilty of this trickery in keeping close to the 

 ground where their brown plumage harmonises so 

 closely with the sandy soil that detection is defied. 

 On our own mountain tops, the Ptarmigan is 

 another noteworthy instance of this peculiar kind 

 of fraud. You may walk right through a crouch- 

 ing flock of these birds, in their brown and gray 

 livery, without seeing a single one, so closely does 

 their plumage assimilate in colour with the moss, 

 lichen, and pebbles amongst which they lie con- 

 cealed. Again, the Snipes are remarkable in 

 this respect, their brown and yellow-striped upper 

 plumage resembling closely the dead blades of 

 grass and the withered leaves ; the Woodcock, 

 especially, being beautifully adapted in this 

 respect. And, then, how closely the plumage 

 of the Red Grouse resembles the heather a 

 coincidence which saves this bird from his 

 numerous enemies. The hen Pheasant is another 

 instance, for at the least alarm she crouches low 

 amongst the drifts of dead leaves, or in the dry 

 grass, where detection is almost impossible. These 

 are but a very few examples, but the reader will 

 call to mind scores of others equally as startling 

 and strange. What is, perhaps, more interesting 

 than the actual resemblance between the plumage 

 of these birds and their surroundings is the 



