THE GOLDEN PHEASANT. ■ ll9 



and eat thein : the moment they are produced. The best remedy I kaow is to 

 procure half a dozen artificial eggs, and let them lie about always, and then the 

 birds, seeing them constantly, regard them less. These kinds of pheasants are 

 raised in confinement much more easily than the Common pheasant of our 

 preserves, the young growing with incredible rapidity if well and frequently fed 

 on custard, boiled eggs, good old cheese — all chopped fine — and mixed with bruised 

 hemp and canary seed. The maggot produced in flesh from the blue fly will tend 

 very greatly to their rapid improvement. I am perfectly aware that ants' eggs are 

 preferable, but when these are not available maggots will be found an excellent 

 substitute, and shoidd be given daUy till the poults are somewhat grown. Wheat, 

 hemp, and barley are the best food for the old stock. It is somewhat singular 

 that neither variety will agree comfortably with the common pheasants in a wood; 

 notwithstanding I have seen the hybrids produced between both these kinds and 

 the common pheasants. Both are very beautiful of their kind, the halfbred Golden 

 being of a strikingly rich auburn, shading into every variety of gold colour; while 

 "the pencUlings " of the hybrid Silver are not equalled by any of the gorgeous 

 plumage we see in bird-skins from foreign climes. I have had opportunities of 

 seeing them constantly for some years, but wiU add that they were invariably 

 unproliflc and sought every possible opportunity to evince their pugnacity to all 

 other birds confined with them. 



"Both Golden and Silver pheasants will endure every severity of our climate. 

 Some years since, I sent some eggs of the latter, from which birds were hatched 

 and turned loose in a large plantation; they bred freely the ensuing year, and 

 well stocked the preserve; the year following some withdrew to a covert at some 

 considerable distance, driving away the common pheasant, taking possession of 

 the whole. Many were purposely shot the next winter, but proved by no means a 

 well-flavoured addition to the dinner-table. Some Golden pheasants' eggs, which I 

 forwarded as a present to a friend whose preserves are among the largest in the 

 kingdom, were hatched very early last season and turned loose; these bore all the 

 rigours of winter as well as any others, but in the spring began to show a decided 

 aversion to their fellows of more sombre hue. The flesh of the Golden is far 

 preferable to that of the Silver pheasant. The crest feathers and ' the cowl ' (or 

 neck feathers) are those so universally coveted by our fishermen, and are always 

 saleable at high prices; for this reason a careful amateur will diligently look after 

 them when she'd by birds kept in an aviary." 



Mr Hewitt further stated that the sexes in the chicks were easily distinguished, 

 the eyes of the cocks being light, those of the hens deep hazel. 



Golden pheasants that have escaped to the coverts and been shot, are found 

 when cooked to be of very delicate flavour, and are described as being very sapid 

 and far preferable to the common species. These escaped birds will sometimes breed 



