79 



BAEBAEY PAETEIDGE. 



ROCK PAETEIDGE. GAMBIA PAETEIDGE. 



Perdix petrosa, .... Govld. 



Perdrix gambra, .... TE^nnycs. 



Perdix — A. Partridge. Petrosa — Belonging to rocks or crags. 



This extremely pretty bird can hardly with propriety be called a British Bird; vet 

 two specimens having been obtained in an apparently wild state, it is now admitted 

 into the British list by most of our naturalists. The two specimens which have occurred 

 in England were both females; they both were procured somewhere about the same time; 

 one was picked up dead in a field at Edmondthorpe, about sis miles from Melton 

 Mowbray, in April, 1842. Mr. Tarrell states that it was afterwards in the possession 

 of Mr. Robert Widdowson, of Melton Mowbray. The other was shot at Sudbourn, in 

 Suffolk, and is now in the possession of Mr. Thomas Goatley, of Chipping Xorton, 

 Oxfordshire. This bird is supposed to have been a descendant of some birds hatched 

 from eggs imported into England by the Marquis of Hertford and Lord Bendlesham, 

 about 1770, by whom the country about Sudbourn was stocked with Bed-legged Par- 

 tridges. It has been thought that some eggs of the Barbary Partridge may have been 

 introduced along with those of the other species. This seems to us to be by no means 

 a satisfactory solution of this bird's occurrence in England; for it is hardly likely that 

 the breed would remain so long as seventy years unnoticed, or that a solitary indivi- 

 dual should be the only one to be found surviving, sola superstes. TVe incline to the 

 opinion that both these birds were accidental stragglers into this country, or else the 

 produce of eggs accidentally introduced with others at a much more recent date than 

 1770. 



The natural habitat of this bird, as indicated by its English name, is the northern 

 pirt of Africa; but it also occurs in Majorca, Minorca, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, 

 Calabria, and the mountainous parts of Spain; some parts of France, Germany, Italy, 

 and Greece. It is also found in Asia. 



Its habits appear to assimilate more to those of the bird last described than to those 



