CHAPTEE II. 



NATURAL HISTORY OF THE PHEASANTS 

 (CONTINUED). 



NON - DOMESTICITY — INTRODUCTION INTO 

 BRITAIN— DISTRIBUTION. 



[pT I S sometimes suggested by persons ignorant of 

 £ tlie true nature of tlie pheasant, that it might be 

 domesticated and reared like our ordinary farm- 

 yard fowl. Such persons are apparently not aware 

 that the instinct of domestication is one of the rarest 

 possessed by animals. Man has been for some thou- 

 sands of years capturing, subduing, and taming hundreds of 

 •different species of animals of all classes ; but of these the 

 number that he has succeeded in really domesticating does 

 not amount to fifty. A very large proportion of animals 

 are capable of being tamed, and rendered perfectly familiar 

 "with man ; but this is a totally distinct state from one of 

 ■domestication. The common pheasant is a good example of 

 this distinction. Individual examples may be rendered so 

 tame as to become even troublesome from their courage and 

 familiarity; but although others have been bred in aviaries 

 for many generations, their offspring still retain their original 

 wildness, and when let out at large betake themselves to 

 the woods and coverts as soon as able to shift for themselves. 

 On the other hand, the allied species, the jungle fowl [Gallus 

 Jerrtigineus) , the original of our domestic breeds of poultry, 

 if reared in confinement, becomes immediately domesticated. 



