90 



berries. Fruits it will eat readily, such as wild strawberries, plums, apples, pears, raspberries ; 

 and amongst the insects it devours are may-bugs, grasshoppers, beetles of various kinds, spiders, 

 flies, larvae of different sorts, the small excrescences on the underside of the leaves of the oak, so- 

 called spangles, wire worms (of which as many as twelve hundred have been found in the crop of 

 a hen Pheasant) ; and this bird has been known to eat a slowworm. 



As above stated, the Pheasant is polygamous, an old and strong cock having a harem of 

 from six to nine females, though at first he will sometimes commence by keeping company with 

 one hen, from which circumstance the older naturalists have in error concluded that it lives, as 

 a rule, in monogamy. When the female wants to lay she withdraws to some quiet place, where, 

 in the dense grass-growth of a thicket, in an old hedgerow, or in a field near a covert, she 

 scratches a depression in the soil, which is lined with dried grasses, roots, and leaves, and in this 

 deposits from eight to twelve eggs. Occasionally two females will have one nest in common ; 

 and an instance is cited by Mr. Tegetmeier of a Pheasant and a Partridge having such a nest, 

 the eggs of the two species being laid indiscriminately together ; and both birds were found 

 sitting side by side in perfect amity. Occasionally, though very rarely, the hen Pheasant will 

 lay in the deserted nest of an Owl or a Squirrel ; but, as a rule, it is a ground-breeder. When 

 the young are hatched they are very carefully tended by the old bird, and fed chiefly on insects, 

 the larvae of ants, so-called ants' eggs being a particularly favourite article of food, the old female 

 placing them before the young ones and encouraging them to pick them up like a domestic hen. 

 When first hatched they are very tender, and require great care on the part of the mother, who 

 collects them and covers them during bad weather and at night ; but when about half-grown they 

 are able to fly up and roost on a branch with the old bird. 



The present species, as above stated, not only breeds freely with other allied Pheasants, but 

 it has been known also to cross with the domestic Fowl, the Guineafowl, the Black Grouse ; and, 

 according to Edwards, it has paired with the Turkey. The birds which are known amongst 

 sportsmen by the name of Mule Pheasants, however, are not hybrids but barren hen birds, either 

 very old birds or else those suffering from a disease or derangement of the generative organs, 

 which have to a larger or less extent assumed the dress of the male bird. I possess two, and 

 have examined several more, of these barren hens, all of which differed a good deal in beauty 

 of plumage, one being almost as richly coloured and marked as the adult male. 



The eggs of the Pheasant are uniform pale olivaceons brown in colour, and average about 

 Iff by 1£$ inch. 



The specimens figured are an adult pair obtained especially for me in Asia Minor by 

 Mr. Pearse of Constantinople; for, after considerable trouble, I found that I could not get a 

 specimen here in England without some admixture of one of the allied species. The specimen 

 nearest to the really wild bird is one I received from Captain Elwes, which differs only in having 

 the markings rather broader and bolder, especially on the upper parts. 



In the preparation of the above article I have examined the following specimens : — 



• E Mus. H. E. Dresser. 



a, 6 , b, 2 . Near Ismid, Asia Minor, January 20th, 1878 (C. Pearse). c, d ad. Colesbourne Park, November 

 20th, 1870 {H. J. Elwes). d, ? steril. Leadenhall Market, October 1875. e, 2 steril. Middleton Hall, 

 T amworth {Ha nbury- Barclay ) . 



