BIRD NOTES. 87 
his wings at dawn.” Yet here again, what wonder that the elu- 
sive whir of the partridge should have defied analysis, when no 
less an authority than the peerless Audubon himself was deceived 
even in the moderate performance of the clumsy rooster—or can 
it be that all the rest of us are blind?—for does he not tell us 
that the grouse “beats his szdes after the manner of the domestic 
cock”? J recall also the parallel lines from the “ Summer-day ” 
of Hume, where the “crested bird” is again misrepresented: 
“With gilded eyes and open wings, 
The cock his courage shows ; 
With claps of joy his breast he dings, 
And twenty times he crows.” 
This will be news to many a country boy who knows the clumsy 
antics of his pet “ Shanghai.” 
We all know the “drummer”; many of us have heard the 
“drumming,” but who will show us the drum ? 
