In the Neighbourhood of Salisbury. 



171 



certainly shows the capabilities of the Peregrine, but still, if the old 

 mottoe, " Live and let live/' were more the order of the day, I don't 

 think airy very great or sensible diminution of the Grouse would be 

 apparent, and there would be a greater chance of seeing oftener 

 such a grand flight as that mentioned above. 



This bird demands a very extensive range of heather for its home, 

 not remaining satisfied with a partial range, as is the Black Grouse. 

 It has been tried more than once to introduce them on the Quantock 

 Hills, in Somerset, but though the range is some miles long, it is 

 not broad or varied enough for the Red Grouse ; and when imported 

 there, they very soon re-crossed the Bristol Channel into some of the 

 Welsh mountains. I was surprised in turn to find that there are 

 no Black Game on the Welsh Hills round Crickhowell and Aber- 

 gavenny, where I was staying the past summer, as I should have 

 thought the situation well suited to their habits. 



Syrrhaptes Paradoxus. Pallas's Sand Grouse. I cannot find any 

 other instance of this rare straggler to our county, except the 

 specimen mentioned by the Rev. A. C. Smith, which was shot in 

 the year of their irruption into Europe (1863) , by Mr. Joseph Dean, 

 of Imber. It was a most extraordinary migration, and the number 

 altogether killed in this country was something considerable. There 

 is a most interesting account in Mr. Stevenson's Birds of Norfolk 

 of their appearance in Norfolk and Suffolk in that year, which 

 would well repay any ornithologist's reading. Those were naturally 

 the counties wherein most might be expected to have been secured ; 

 and he records the total number of specimens obtained in those 

 counties as being in all seventy-five; thirty males and thirty females 

 in Norfolk, and eight males and seven females in Suffolk. The 

 first being picked up dead on Yarmouth beach on May 23rd, the 

 last, a male, said to have been shot near Lynn, in the last week of 

 November. 



Ferdix Cinerea. " The Partridge." The hird, par excellence, of all 

 others in a sportsman's eye, as is proved in common sporting parlance 

 by the usual soubriquet of "Birds " being used to designate them, 

 instead of the proper name which distinguishes the species, for few 

 would talk of having bagged so many Partridges, but rather so 



VOL. XX. — NO. LIX. N 



