340 BRITISH BIRDS. 



lower parts of the neck and the breast reddish 

 chesnut, with black indented edges; the sides and 

 lower part of the breast the same, with pretty large 

 tips of black to each feather, which in different 

 lights vary to a glossy purple ; the belly and vent 

 are dusky; back and scapulars beautifully varie- 

 gated with black and white, or cream colour speck- 

 led with black, and mixed with deep orange, all 

 the feathers are edged with black; on the lower 

 part of the back there is a mixture of green; the 

 quills are dusky, freckled with white; wing coverts 

 brown, glossed with green, and edged with white; 

 rump plain reddish brown; the two middle feathers 

 of the tail are about twenty inches long, the shortest 

 on each side less than five, of a reddish brown, 

 marked with transverse bars of black; legs dusky, 

 with a short blunt spur on each, but in some old 

 birds the spurs are as sharp as needles; between 

 the toes there is a strong membrane. 



The female is less, and does not exhibit that 

 variety and brilliancy of plumage which distinguish 

 the male: the general colours are light and dark 

 brown, mixed with black, the breast and belly 

 finely freckled with small black spots on a light 

 ground; the tail is short, and barred somewhat like 

 that of the male ; the space round the eye is covered 

 Avith feathers.* 



* The Hen Pheasant is sometimes known, when she has done 

 breeding to assume the garb of a male. The late eminent phy- 

 siologist, John Hunter, in a paper read before the Royal Society, 

 and published in the Philosophical Transactions for 1780, says 

 ''It is remarked by those who are conversant with this bird, when 

 wild, that there appears now and then a Hen Pheasant with the 

 feathers of the cock; and all that they have decided on this subject 



