28 
A HEN IN MALE ATTIRE. 
hours and hours in search of it, and were likely to return 
home with an empty game-bag. 
The Scotch naturalist, Macgillivray, seems to think Phea- 
sant-shooting but poor sport; he says — *I am much in- 
clined to persuade myself that a brace of Ptarmigans brought 
home after a hard day's marching, from the craggy summit 
of some misty hill in the Gael land, could afford more 
pleasure than a whole thicket full of Pheasants.' There 
spoke a true son of 
The land of brown heath and shaggy wood, 
Land of the mountain and the flood. 
But those who dwell amid the tamer although not less 
beautiful scenery of England, may find a pleasure in 
traversing the chalky downs of Sussex, the green hills of 
Surrey, or the fertile valleys of our own lovely Kent, in 
pursuit, at once, of health, and the golden-plumed bird 
with the burnished neck, and eye bright as a diamond in a 
crimson setting. Hear how enthusiastically Knox, in his 
* Ornithological Rambles in Sussex,' speaks of the pleasures 
of such pursuits. After alluding to the murderous battue, 
which he utterly condemns, he says, ^ How different is the 
pursuit of the Pheasant with the aid of spaniels in the thick 
cover of the Weald, or tracking him with a single steady 
setter among some of the wilder portions of the forest 
range ! Intently observing your dog, and anticipating the 
wily artifices of some old cock, with spurs as long as a 
dragoon's, who will sometimes lead you for a mile through 
bog, bi ake, fen, and heather, before the sudden drop of your 
staunch companion, and a rigidity in all his limbs, satisfy 
you that you have at last compelled the bird to squat under 
the wide holly bush, from whence you knock him up, and 
feel some exultation as you bring him down with a snap 
shot, having only caught a glimpse of him as he endea- 
voured to escape on the opposite side of the tree.' 
A singular circumstance connected with the Pheasant is, 
that the females sometimes assume the plumage of the 
male, and when this is the case it is advisable to destroy 
them, for they are incapable of performing the maternal 
functions, and are generally fierce and mischievous, fre- 
