108 The Natural History of British Game Birds 
sharpness, the cock Reeves's Pheasant is a dangerous bird, even to its own species. 
I once saw a cock in the late Mr. Cholmondeley's aviaries at Condover kill three hens, 
which had been procured from China at great expense, in as many minutes. Two 
were struck dead instantaneously, a spur entering the back of the neck, whilst the 
third was cut open down the back in such a way that it had to be destroyed. At 
Woburn, in Bedfordshire, where the species does well in the large fir woods on sandy 
soil, it is a glorious sight to see them and other rare Pheasants sunning themselves 
in the woodland rides, and uttering their whistling scream of defiance. The males are 
great fighters in spring. I watched a combat there one May morning for a quarter 
of an hour, between two grand males with five foot tails. It was a splendid sight as 
both rose 6 or 8 feet as if by one impulse, and tried to strike downwards with beak 
and spur. The curious part of the affair was that neither seemed to touch his oppo- 
nent, each avoiding the blow with all the arts of the skilled fencer. 
The first specimen of this Pheasant in Europe was imported in 1831 by a Mr. Reeves, 
and a pair was seen in the Zoological Gardens in 1838, where they created something 
like a sensation. Mr. Tegetmeier tells us that most of the living birds now in this 
country are owing to the exertions of the late Mr. John Stone and Mr. Walter Medhurst. 
At first there was much difficulty in obtaining the birds, as the main habitat, which 
we now know to be Chi-li and the mountains of North and Western China, was not 
known. At the present time large numbers of Reeves's Pheasants are kept in pens, 
and for general beauty no birds, except the Birds of Paradise, surpass them. The 
females are very uncertain layers in confinement, and do not seem to reach maturity, 
or their full egg-laying powers, until their third year. The male, too, does not grow 
to full size and beauty until the third or fourth season. 
To enjoy the surpassing beauty of this species the naturalist must see Reeves's 
Pheasant in perfect freedom, and on ground similar to their natural habitat, and this 
spectacle can be witnessed properly only, as far as I know, at Guisachan in Ross-shire, 
formerly the seat of Lord Tweedmouth. To see a covey, for they often fly in a flock 
together, rise above the highest trees on a steep mountain side, and after uttering their 
peculiar cry, dash on at express speed, far greater than any other Pheasants, is a sight 
one can never forget. Until the year 1890 I had seen and shot several Reeves's 
Pheasants, and under ordinary conditions of covert-shooting was content to consider 
the bird hardly a success from the shooter's point of view. During the autumn of 
that year, however, I received an invitation to the annual covert shoot at Guisachan, 
Lord Tweedmouth's beautiful seat, near Beauly, in Ross-shire, and it was there, amidst 
the wildest and shaggiest of Scotch scenery — in country which must to a great extent 
resemble the true home of the bird in question — that I had cause to alter my opinion. 
In one high wood of old Scotch firs, on a steep and broken hillside above the 
waterfall, the sight of these birds coming along only just within gunshot, in company 
with Common Pheasants and Blackcocks, I shall never forget. I say, " in company 
with," but, as a matter of fact, as soon as one of the long-tailed sky-rockets cleared 
the trees, he left the others far behind, and came forward at a pace which was little 
short of terrific. I doubt if any bird of the genus goes faster. 
Now this is all that the sportsman wants. Here we have a bird of unrivalled 
