450 On Hybrids produced in a Wild State 
where the hornbeam is abundant.* In this vicinity it seems rapidly 
increasing, and will probably ere long be equally common with its 
ally the Greenfinch. 
VII On Hybrids produced in a Wild State between the Black- 
Grouse (Telrao tetrix^) and Common Pheasant (Phasianus Col- 
chicus.) By WILLIAM THOMPSON, Esq. Vice- President of the 
Belfast Natural History Society. t 
HAVING lately heard that a hybrid bird, bred between the com- 
mon pheasant (Phasianus Colchicus, Linn.) and black grouse (Te- 
trao tetrix, Linn.) had been shot in Wigtonshire, and was preserved 
for Sir Andrew Agnew, Bart., M. P., through the medium of our 
mutual friend, Captain Foyrer, R. N., I proposed a few queries 
respecting it. Sir Andrew, on receiving these, thought an examina- 
tion of the specimen would prove more satisfactory than a mere 
reply, and, with the kindest consideration, sent the bird from Loch- 
naw Castle for my inspection. He states that it was shot in the 
autumn of 1835 in a wild state at Lochnaw, where it had been seen 
several times on the wing by persons who imagined it to be a wild 
turkey. Pheasants and black grouse are numerous in the surround- 
ing plantations ; but this is the only bird of the kind that has been 
observed. 
In four instances only am I aware of similar hybrids being re- 
corded. The first is mentioned in White's History of Selborne as a 
curious bird, shot in a coppice at the Holt, and sent by Lord Stawell 
for his inspection. Its parentage was not rightly conjectured by Mr 
White, nor even by several later authors who have endeavoured from 
his description to make it out. In a note, however, to p. 344 of a late 
edition of this work (8vo ed. 1833), the Hon. and Rev. William 
Herbert mentions having seen the specimen in the collection of the 
Earl of Egremont at Pet worth, and speaks decisively to its true parent- 
age. The second specimen was exhibited at a meeting of the Zoo- 
logical Society of London on the 24th of June 1834, by Joseph 
Sabine, Esq. who stated that it was bred in Cornwall.} The third, 
shot near Merrington, in Shropshire, was announced to the same 
Society on the 12th of May 1835, by T. C. Eyton, Esq. by whom 
it was described in some detail. In the preface to a subsequent 
* This is not the case, nor is it a natural consequence to the abundance of the 
Hornbeam. 
f Read before this Society on Dec. 7, 1836, when the specimen from the 
collection of Sir A. Agnew, Bart, was exhibited. 
t Proc. Zool. Soc. 1834, p. 52. Ibid. 1835, p. 62. 
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