246 CLASS AVKS. 



greatest degree of skill in the art of approaching these 

 birds. 



When the male wood-grovis is about to leave off the sin- 

 gular cries which he utters during the breeding season, the 

 females begin to make their nests. They place them on the 

 ground, in briars, or some other covert place ; this nest is in- 

 artificial, and formed of moss. The eggs seldom exceed a 

 dozen, and are not much larger than those of hens, though 

 of an obtuser form. Their colour is whitish-yellow, marked 

 with great and small irregular spots, of a clear and yellowish 

 tint. Incubation lasts about four weeks. The females hatch 

 with a wonderful degree of assiduity, and it is not uncommon 

 for them to be taken alive upon the nest ; in consequence of 

 this attachment to their eggs and young, the birds of prey 

 and foxes are enabled to make great havoc amongst them. 



It is very difficult to accustom the wood-grous (and the 

 same may be said of all the other species of this genus) to a 

 state of domestication. The attempts made for this purpose 

 have never well succeeded. When deprived of liberty, these 

 birds languish for some time, and the greater number perish 

 in less than a year. It is, however, more easy to bring up 

 those that have been hatched by a turkey-hen. 



The crop of the wood-grous is very large, and of a rounded 

 form ; the tongue is small and pointed ; the glottis is pro- 

 vided with small pointed papillae ; the trachea descending 

 along the neck on the left side, forms a circumvolution, 

 nearly in the middle of its passage, over the great muscles of 

 the neck ; in turning, it ascends abovit an inch and a half, 

 and then, curving again, it descends along the oesophagus 

 into the cavity of the thorax ; two muscles are adherent to 

 the upper larynx, which follow the direction of the tube of 

 the trachea as far as its first curve ; they are then directed 

 immediately on the lower part of the trachea, which repairs 

 to the lungs. These muscles elongate or shorten the trachea, 



