Preface. vii 



the requirements of men who are more 

 sportsmen than they are naturalists \ and 

 I have accordingly, since my return to 

 England, devoted my leisure time to its 

 preparation. 



My object has been to make this volume 

 as concise as possible, and to assign such 

 characters to the various groups and to 

 the individual species as can be easily 

 understood. It has been my aim through- 

 out to select characters which apply to both 

 sexes without exception. This is, I believe, 

 the first attempt yet made to render the 

 identification of the female game birds 

 easy. It is too much the practice to pass 

 the females of this group over with a brief 

 and insufficient description, or, when 

 figuring them, to place them as small, 

 and frequently unrecognisable, objects in 

 the background. 



Although a considerable time has 

 passed since the large work of Messrs. 

 Hume and Marshall was published, I 

 regret to say that very little additional 

 information regarding the habits of the 



