590 FURTHER NOTES ON 
‘Manuel d’Ornith.’ ed. 1, pt. ii. pp. 459-460, and by Meyer, 
in his ‘ Vogel Liv- und Esthlands.’ Nevertheless many 
naturalists still hold the Middle Wood-Grouse to be a hybrid 
between the hen Capercaillie and the Blackcock. Dr. Nilsson, 
for instance, who emphatically declares that, after carefully 
interrogating the Swedish and Finnish sportsmen, he elicited 
the fact that the Hybrid Cock-is only found where the cock 
Capercaillies have been so thinned by over-shooting that the 
hens have been obliged to betake themselves to the drumming- 
places of the Blackcock, &. &.” 
From this one sees how strongly the old authority, Brehm, 
held the belief that Tetrao medius was a true species, and not 
a cross, and the grounds which he gives for so doing are 
good, if not, as it seems, quite unimpeachable.. Seven pages 
of his book are devoted to this discussion; but from all the 
excellent and very learned arguments that he adduces I will, 
for want of space, only quote for my readers one passage 
which bears very strongly upon the special case which we are 
now considering.. It runs thus :—“ And all the Hybrid Cocks 
hitherto seen are so exactly similar in colour. Does this 
agree with other observations on the colour of hybrids? It 
is evident that the Middle Wood-Grouse, if it be a cross, has 
nothing of the mother about it, with the slight exception of 
the head, the chin-feathers (‘ Bart”), and the size of the body ; 
but even in all these parts it bears a certain resemblance to 
the Blackcock. 
“Tt really is a large Black-Grouse with a clipped tail, not 
unlike that of the Greyhen. No special home can, however, 
be assigned to the Middle Wood-Grouse, yet what does this 
matter ? There are plenty of birds which are universally un- 
common. The Lapp Owl (Strix lapponica), for example, and 
many others. Why should not the Middle Wood-Grouse be 
everywhere rare and yet a distinct species? Besides, Tem- 
minck, in speaking of the Middle Wood-Grouse, explicitly 
