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with grey ; wings as in the male Capercaillie, but the secondaries have the basal portion white, and the 

 wing-coverts are much darker ; tail forked, the outer feathers graduated and slightly inclined to curve 

 outwards, in colour jet-black, except at the base, where it is white, and the central feathers are narrowly 

 tipped with that colour ; underparts black, on the throat and breast richly glossed with purple ; feathers 

 about the vent white at the tip, black at the base ; under tail-coverts black, marked with pure white ; 

 Under wing-coverts nearly pure white. 

 The female " Rackelfogel," or hybrid, is not unlike the Greyhen, and is not unfrequently mistaken for her. 

 It may, however, always be distinguished by the form of the tail, which is square at the end, not 

 rounded as in the female Capercaillie, or forked as in the Greyhen ; and the under tail-coverts do not, 

 as in the latter, reach to the end of the tail. Mr. Lloyd, in his ' Gamebirds and Wildfowl of Sweden/ 

 gives woodcuts of the tails of the three females, clearly showing the distinguishing characters. 



This magnificent Grouse, the largest of its family, is found throughout Northern Europe, 

 extending to Central Europe, and is even met with in the forests on the mountain-ranges in the 

 southern or southern-central portions of the Western Palsearctic region. Formerly it is said to 

 have been common throughout Great Britain, but has in most parts been long extinct. Though 

 some forty years ago it was almost extinct in Scotland, it is now, thanks to the exertions of 

 Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, firmly reestablished in that country ; and Mr. Robert Gray writes 

 that in the counties of " Perthshire and Forfarshire it breeds extensively, and has become so 

 firmly established that proprietors of the forests in which it is found do not now object to its 

 falling to the sportsman's gun. In some places, indeed, it has been thought prudent to thin the 

 Capercaillies where they have become numerous. Mr. Geike, factor to the Earl of Airlie, lately 

 informed me that he has seen as many as fifteen brace killed in a day by one shooting-party. 

 These birds are also abundant on the estate of the Earl of Breadalbane, where of late years they 

 have increased to a great extent. Stray birds are often seen in the counties adjacent to the two 

 just mentioned. Numbers are sent to the Glasgow poulterers; but, from the rankness of their 

 flesh, they are not much esteemed for the table — a quality which in these degenerate poaching- 

 days must materially lessen the chances of their destruction." 



Mr. Lloyd, the well-known sportsman and naturalist, who was instrumental in the reintro- 

 duction of the Capercaillie into Scotland, gives the particulars in the following words : — " In the 

 autumn of 1836 the late Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, then recently returned from Taymouth 

 Castle, where he had been much struck with the great capabilities of the woods for the naturali- 

 zation of the Capercaillie, took up the affair in good earnest, and, as with every thing else in 

 which his energetic mind was engaged, with the determination of carrying it through if possible. 

 ' Influenced by the desire, in which I am sure you will concur,' so he wrote to me, ' to introduce 

 these noble birds into Scotland, coupled with that of making Lord Breadalbane some return for 

 his recent kindness to me, I request you to procure for his lordship, at whatever cost, the 

 requisite number.' He at the same time placed his head keeper at my disposal — no slight 

 sacrifice for a Norfolk game-preserver. It was, indeed, an onerous commission, as prior to this 

 time it had been a matter of difficulty to procure even a brace of living Capercali in Sweden ; 

 but by distributing placards throughout the country offering ample rewards, and by instructing 

 the peasants how to knot their snares so as not to kill the birds, my object was at length gained, 

 and within a few months of the receipt of the Baronet's letter, twenty-nine Capercali, followed 



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