258 
THE BIRDS OF HAMPSHIRE. 
In the Island, in the present day, they flourish very 
well, wherever there is suitable covert.^ 
Genu S — Caccabis. 
197. Caccabis rufa. Red-legged Partridge. 
French Partridge. 
A resident, and common in many parts of the mainland, 
but very rare in the Isle of Wight. An introduced species. 
At the present time this bird is common in the Central 
Hill district and in the New Forest, but not in the Northern 
Woodlands. 
The bird was introduced into the eastern counties 
about the year 1770, and quite close to our borders, at 
Harting, in Sussex, in 1776. In that year (so the " History 
of Harting" informs us) Sir Henry Fetherstonhaugh 
imported from France several sittings of the eggs of Perdix 
rufa ; and in the subsequent correspondence between him 
and his mother we learn that the hatching was perfectly 
successful, and that several coveys were bred in the walled 
gardens attached to Harting Place and in the Park. 
We might have supposed that they would have soon 
reached such a congenial spot as Wolmer Forest, but they 
certainly did not, for we find no trace of them in the 
journals and letters of White. The author of the " History 
of Harting " also tells us that they had vanished from the 
district by the middle of the next century, nor is there 
any mention of the bird in Hawker's works, except with 
reference to the county of Suffolk. 2 
^ "Hants Court Guide." 
^ " Diary of Colonel Peter Hawker." Vol. i., pp. 13, 14. 
