CHAPTER XIX. 



RED GROUSE: Natural History. 



To the ordinary game-preserver the natural history of the 

 Red Grouse or, to adopt the usual appellation, of the 

 grouse is unimportant compared with that of the 

 pheasant, the partridge, or even the Black Grouse, in- 

 asmuch as of all game-birds Tetrao scoticus has most right 

 to be denominated wild. The whole system of grouse- 

 preservation nowadays is so much an art that a mere know- 

 ledge of the habits of the bird, such as may be imparted 

 in the limits of the present work, can but serve as a start- 

 ing-point from which its life-history may be gathered. 



When dealing with the Red Grouse, we come to a 

 totally different form of preservation from that by which 

 partridges and pheasants are maintained ; so much so that 

 the knowledge acquired by a Highland keeper, with a 

 life-long experience upon certain moors, is something that 

 he cannot impart to others upon any hard-and-fast lines 

 of instruction. The man with intuitive faculties in this 

 direction, reasoning perhaps largely by analogy, will be 

 able to grasp precisely what certain moors require, and 

 extend that particular form of preservation towards them 

 which will bring permanent success. Another, lacking 

 these instincts, will be incapable of grasping the situation, 

 and all the teaching in the world will not enable him to 

 preserve grouse satisfactorily or successfully. 



However much, moreover, the preserver may desire to 



