218 
POPULAR HISTORY OP BIEDS. 
white, and it is with great difficulty that the bird can be 
distinguished when the ground is covered with snow. Some 
of the species shelter themselves in winter in holes, which 
they burrow in the snow, and may also sometimes get the 
berries which are covered and preserved there. 
In the following picture, by the gallant Lieutenant She- 
rard Osborn, this bird relieves the desolation of the scene 
— a scene often witnessed by the Arctic voyager : — On 
the road we observed old traces of musk-oxen going south. 
Scanty tufts of saxifrage struggled for light through the 
superincumbent mass ; and here andj there a lichen, of a 
bright crimson colour, appeared on the larger masses of 
stone. The cry of a ptarmigan w^as the only indication of 
animal life or sound that broke the stillness of this barren 
and solitary region^.''^ 
The genus TetraogaUus'\ is found on the lofty moun- 
tains of India, and consists of four handsome species, called 
Snow Partridges. The T. HimalaT/ensis is about five times 
larger than the English partridge. Yigne, in his travels 
in Kashmir, met with it, and suggested that it might be 
* Lieutenant Osborn, 'Journal' (May 14tli, 1851). Additional Papers 
relative to the Arctic Expedition, p. 94. 
t Illustrated and described in Gould's ' Birds of Asia/ part v. (Oct. 1, 1853). 
