186 Birds. 



society of its fellows, in the old grey church tower, the ruined castle, 

 the beetling cliffs, the comfortable stack of chimneys, yet there was 

 an old hollow ash tree in one of our fields which at different times 

 was tenanted by a solitary pair : they were all destroyed in succes- 

 sion, but the epithet of "the daw's tree" recorded the simple tale, till 

 it, in its turn, fell by the hand of man. 



The Red Grouse. On Monday, January 17th, 1842, 1 heard of a 

 most remarkable deviation from the usual habits of its species, in the 

 case of a female red grouse, a bird, the very mention of whose name 

 recals to memory the brown heath, and its bold challenge from the 

 hill side. Familiar as I have been for many years past with their 

 habits, I should have been the last to imagine that in any instance 

 one of this species would voluntarily leave its native haunts, and take 

 up its residence amongst drifting sand-hills, overgrown with bent 

 grass (Agrostis), such as stretch along our coast from Whitberry Point 

 to Scoughall Burn, about sia^ miles as the crow flies, from the nearest 

 heath-clad slope of the Lammermoors. It was here that a solitary 

 female was seen in the winter of 1841 ; and in the following summer, 

 Mr. Martine, gamekeeper to the Earl of Haddington, found her at- 

 tended by a brood of young ones, which arrived at maturity, and 

 frequented their native haunts for several months, till the whole were 

 killed by poachers or otherwise disappeared. Having at different 

 times, in all seasons and in all weathers, wandered in its usual haunts, 

 I am enabled, in some measure, to appreciate the beautiful accuracy 

 displayed in my friend Professor Macgillivray's account of its habits. 

 From his long practical acquaintance with this bird in the Hebrides, 

 where sand-hills, covered with bent, abound, there is some reason for 

 inferring that perhaps the above-mentioned fact is unparalleled. 



The Pheasant and Partridge. Every one is familiar with the pa- 

 rasitic habits of the cuckoo, but I dare say few have heard of a very 

 anomalous proceeding on the part of the pheasant and partridge. 

 My attention was first directed to it on the 8th of June, 1840, by a 

 mower calling upon me to examine a nest fi'om which he had just 

 driven a female pheasant, and which contained seven partridge's eggs 

 in addition to nine of her own. On mentioning the circumstance to 

 the gamekeeper, he averred that it was not uncommon, his assistants 

 corroborating the statement : Mr. VV. Martine, a native of one of the 

 midland counties of England, gamekeeper to Mrs. H. N. Ferguson 

 of Biel, informed me that he had long known the fact, that it was by 



