THE WOOD GROUSE OR CAPERCAILZIE. 137 
could have been in this country. It also seems to 
extend to several districts of Northern Asia. It is 
perliaps most abundant in some parts of Russia, Nor- 
way, and Sweden, and it is from thence that an annua, 
supply of this and another bird, the Tetrao medius, 
is furnished to the London markets. In these coun- 
tries tliey frequent the deep and far-spreading forests 
of pine, feeding on the young shoots and cones, the 
catkins of the birch, and berries of the juniper which 
form the undertvood. They are polygamous, and at 
the commencement of incubation, the male places 
himself conspicuously, and attracts the female by 
his loud cries, “ resembling Peller, peller, -peller, and 
various attitudes. On hearing the call of the cock, 
the hens, whose cry in some degree resembles tbe 
croak of the raven, or rather, perhaps, the sounds 
Gock-gock, gock, assemble from all parts of the sur- 
rounding forest. The male bird now descends, from 
the eminence on which he was perched, to the 
grountl, where he and bis female friends join com- 
pany.” * When the females really commence incuba- 
tion, they are forsaken, the males skulking among 
the brushwood and renewing their plumage, while she 
attends to the hatching and rearing of her progeny. 
The male is nearly three feet in length, and gains 
a weight of sometimes fifteen pounds. The feathers 
of the head and cheeks are elongated, and tluring his 
displays of courtship, the former are raised, and those 
on the cheeks brought forward. The back of the 
* From Lloyd’s Northern Field Sports. 
