26 
HISTORY OF 
sessed of the specimen, through the kindness of the Rev. John 
Sandford, who was a resident near the place at the time it was 
killed. When I saw it, all doubt of what it really was vanished ; 
and I had the pleasure of placing the first British specimen of 
Tetrao Rupestris in the collection of my friend the Earl of Derby, 
then Lord Stanley,” (to whom we are indebted for being able to 
give a cut of the bird.) “ My speculation was, that the bird 
had been driven to our island, by some accident, from Norway; 
and I should have continued to hold this opinion to be correct, 
but that I observed, in the Report of the British Association, 
page 611, in a ‘ Catalogue of Birds observed in Sutherlandsliire,’ 
in June 1834, by P. J. Selby, Esq. that there is in No. 51 an 
account of L. Rupestris killed on the Benmore range.” 
The principal differences between the Rock Grouse and the 
Ptarmigan exist in the summer plumage and in the size, the 
Rock Ptarmigan being rather the smallest. In the summer 
plumage they appear to differ principally, according to Captain 
Sabine, in the upper plumage of the Ptarmigan being cinereous, 
with undulating and narrow black lines and minute spots; while 
in the Rock Grouse each feather is black, cut by transverse 
broad lines or bars of a reddish yellow, which do not reach 
the shaft, and have spaces between them broader than them- 
selves; the feathers are tipped in the male with a light colour, 
which in the female approaches to white. In the winter plumage, 
except in size, the resemblance is still more near ; the Rock 
Grouse being of a snowy white, with the exception of the six 
larger quills which are black, and the tail feathers, which (with 
the exception of the two lateral ones which are white) are 
also black, slightly tipped with white in the male ; a black 
stripe passes from the nostrils, through the eye, to the back 
of the head. 
