ORDER GALLINiE. 225 



We come now to the Pheasants, properly so called. 

 Their generic characters are, a moderate bill, with the base 

 naked ; upper mandible, vaulted, convex, and depressed 

 towards the end ; nostrils, basal and lateral, and half-closed 

 by a vaulted membrane ; cheeks covered with small verru- 

 cose barbies ; head and throat covered with feathers ; feet 

 with three toes before and one behind ; three anterior toes, 

 united by a short membrane ; a conical spur on the tarsus ; 

 tail considerably graduated, conical, and composed of 

 eighteen quills ; wings, short ; the three external remiges 

 shorter than the fourth and fifth, which are tlie longest of all, 



Montbeillard, the coadjutor of BufFon, thus speaks of the 

 native country of the Common Pheasant, ( Phasianus Col- 

 chicus) — 



"It is sufficient to name this bird to remind us of the 

 place of its origin. The pheasant, that is, the bird of the 

 Phasis, was, it is said, exclusively confined to Colchis, before 

 the expedition of the Argonauts ; those Greeks, ascending the 

 Phasis, to arrive at Colchis, beheld these fine birds spread along 

 the banks of the river, and by bringing them back to their 

 owTi country, bestowed upon it a gift more precious than the 

 golden fleece. At the present day, the pheasants of Colchis, 

 or Mingrelia, and some other of the neighbouring countries, 

 are the finest and largest in {he known world." 



From these countries they have been extended into almost 

 all the regions of the known world. They are found in the 

 major part of Europe ; they are very abundant in Spain, in 

 Italy, in some parts of Germany, (Bohemia in particular) 

 and in the South of France. In the North, they are less 

 common. The species, says M. Temminck, would soon be 

 destroyed in Holland, if a certain number were not destined 

 every year to repeople the woods and parks. To procure 

 pheasants for this purpose, one or many small places are 

 cleared in the middle of the wood, about t1)rcc or four feet in 



vol.. VIII. (i 



