188 The Japanese Pheasant. 



other game preservers in his district, the race soon spread 

 throughout the county. " Prom personal observation and 

 inquiry, however," writes Mr. Stevenson, " during the last 

 two or three years, it appears, evidences of this cross, even in 

 the coverts where these hybrids were most plentiful, are now 

 scarcely perceptible ; the strong characteristics of the Chinese 

 bird apparently absorbing all the less marked though darker 

 tints of the Japanese. One of these birds, killed in 1853, 

 weighed upwards of four and a half poimds, and many 

 examples, which were stuffed for the beauty of their plumage, 

 will be found in the collections of our country gentlemen." 



In one respect the Japanese cross has been found not wholly 

 satisfactory. It is difficult to manage in covert and is an 

 irregular flier. The cross between the Mongolian and the 

 Chinese birds, on the other hand, produces as large a bird and 

 a bolder flier, and in consequence has been much more widely 

 sought after. 



The absorption of the Japanese in the more common race 

 is not surprising when the small interfusion of new blood is 

 taken into consideration, but with the fresh introduction of 

 new blood, and the care in the preservation of the cross-bred 

 birds, there can be no doubt a permanent breed would result, 

 bearing the same relation to the pure-bred Japanese that the 

 common ring-neck does to the pure-blooded Chinese species. 



