PARTRIDGE. 
355 
Diet. — Ib. Supp Lewin s Br. Birds, 4. t. 136. — Wale. Syn. 2. t. 184. — Pult. 
Cat. Dorset, p. 7. — Bewick’s Br. Birds, 1. p. t. 305. — Selby, pi. 61. p. 314.* 
LOCAL VARIETIES. 
Perdix montana. Lath. Ind. Orn. 2. p. 646. sp. 1 1. — Tetrao montanus, Grnel. Syst. 
p, 788. sp. 33. — Perdix Daraascena, Lath. Ind. Orn. 2. p. 646. sp. 10. — Tetrao 
Datnascena, Gmel. Syst. p. 758. — Damascus Partridge, Lath. Syn. 4. p. 764. 9. 
— Mountain Partridge, lb. 4. p, 765. 10. 
This species is so well known as to require very little description. 
Length about thirteen inches ; weight fifteen ounces. The bill is bluish 
brown ; irides hazel. General colour of the plumage cinereous brown 
and black mixed ; some of the back and coverts streaked with buff; 
sides of the head bright rust-colour; behind the eye a naked, red, warty 
skin ; on the breast a deep bay-coloured mark, in form of a horseshoe. 
The tail consists of sixteen feathers of a bright rust^colour, except 
the four middle ones, which are like the back ; legs bluish grey. 
The female weighs about fourteen ounces ; the head is less bright, 
and the coverts of the ears inclining to grey ; the horseshoe on the 
breast is white for the first year, afterwards more or less like the male, 
and by the third year is no longer a mark of distinction ; whereas by 
the head the sexes may always be known ; the hare skin behind the 
eye is less conspicuous, and very little red. 
It has been long an esteemed opinion amongst sportsmen as well as 
naturalists, that the female Partridge had none of the bay feathers on 
the breast like the male. This, however, is a mistake, as we have 
proved by the unerring rule of dissection ; for happening to kill nine 
old birds one day, with very little variation as to the bay markings on 
the breast, we were led to open them all, by which we discovered five 
of them were females ; and by re-examining the plumage found the 
males could only be known by the superior brightness of colour about 
the head, which alone seems to be the mark of distinction after the 
first or second year. 
This bird is found in all parts of Great Britain where corn is culti- 
vated, but never at any great distance from arable land : upon the barren 
mountains of the north it is never seen. In Scotland the Partridge, 
the grous, and the ptarmigan, each have their district : the first is only 
found in the glens or valleys ; the second on the first hills ; the last on 
the summits of the highest mountains ; and it is very rarely that they 
intrude upon each other ; though we have killed the three species in 
the same day. 
The Partridge is very j3rolific, layiiig from twelve to twenty eggs. It 
makes no nest, but scrapes a small hollow in the ground, placing a few 
contiguous fibres therein to deposit its eggs on ; these are of a light 
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