LETTERS. 349 



In spite of my exhaustive papers on the plumage of the 

 Red Grouse published between 1893 and 1895, Mr. Millais 

 (p. 38) makes the following statement* : — 



" Until 1909 naturalists do not seem to have devoted much time to 

 the study of the summer plumage of the Red Grouse, probably owing 

 to the difficulty of obtaining specimens. Mr. Ogilvie-Grant, in his 

 excellent little book on the Game Birds (p. 29), considers that the 

 Red Grouse, being an insular form, living in warmer latitudes where 

 a white winter dress is unnecessary, has gradually dropped the spring 

 moult necessary to his northern relation, the Willow Grouse, and in 

 the main he is right ; but not completely so. He states definitely, 

 moreover, that the male breeds in the ' winter dress,' suggesting that 

 there is no accession of new feathers similar to the summer dress of 

 the Willow Grouse, and in this he is incorrect " [the italics are mine]. 



If before publishing the above extraordinary and entirely 

 misleading statement Mr. Millais had taken the trouble to 

 visit the Bird-Room at the Natural History Museum, he might 

 there have inspected a series of Red Grouse, both male and 

 female, killed in every month of the year, which must have 

 convinced him that it was he himself who was entirely in 

 error. Though I have not retained for the Museum the whole 

 material examined in the flesh (some 200 birds killed 

 throughout the year), he would have found a series of about 

 150 carefully selected specimens, which when laid out month 

 by month tell their own story. 



I must most emphatically deny that " a considerable 

 pattern change " takes place in the winter-plumage of the 

 male ; nothing of the kind occurs, though with the approach 

 of spring and the greater abundance of food the birds possibly 

 become more glossy, the secretions of the oil-gland, with 

 which the feathers are lubricated and polished being no doubt 

 more copious at that season. Males in winter-plumage vary 

 greatly ; in some individuals the upperparts are almost 

 entirely clad in the chestnut-and-black winter-plumage and 

 very few of the more coarsely-marked buff-and-black autumn- 

 feathers are retained, in others a greater or lesser number of 

 autumn-feathers are conspicuous among the new winter- 

 plumage. These differences are purely individual, as was 

 fully set forth in my " Handbook to the Game-Birds " 

 (i., p. 30). 



Probably these variously marked birds retaining a greater 

 or lesser number of autumn-feathers are what Mr. Millais 

 alludes to when he asserts (p. 38) that " a considerable 

 pattern change was also noticeable." 



* The same statement had previously been published by Mr. Millais 

 in the Supplement to the " Field " on the 7th of August, 1909, p. vii., 

 headed " The Summer Plumage of the Cock Grouse," but had escaped 

 my attention. 



