10 
Lost British Birds. 
specimens of a lost species. So long as specimens exist the 
dead bird is not regarded as wholly and for ever lost; but 
rather as having a kind of post-mortem existence, highly 
advantageous to science—a quiet immortality aloof from the 
perturbations of nature. When the Capercaillie, after a 
long and gradual decline, had finally gone out, it was found 
that not one preserved example existed; consequently, we 
do not know just what the bird was like. Probably it 
differed somewhat from the Capercaillie of Northern Europe ; 
and we may be certain of this—that the British race had 
existed apart from the Continental races from exceedingly re¬ 
mote times, that its isolation must have been brought about 
by geologic changes, which severed this country from the 
mainland. Consequently, the Capercaillie, which now 
happily ranks as a member of the British avi-fauna, is not 
an indigenous bird, but introduced, and, like the red-legged 
partridge and the pheasant, an exotic. 
With the second part of its history—namely, the restora¬ 
tion of the species, I have no business to deal in this paper; 
but no reader will grudge me the pleasure of saying some¬ 
thing on the subject, since this forms the one bright and 
pleasant chapter in a story which is otherwise altogether dark 
and disastrous. And here I wish to express my gratitude 
to Mr. Harvie-Brown for his volume on the Capercaillie in 
Scotland , which contains a full account of the reintroduction 
of that fine bird, and its subsequent progress down to the 
present time. 
In 1827, and again in 1829, some attempts to introduce 
the Capercaillie were made, but were not successful. The 
late Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton then took the matter up. 
He had been staying at Taymouth Castle on the Tay, and 
“ influenced by a desire to introduce these noble birds into 
Scotland, coupled with that of making Lord Breadalbane 
some return for his recent kindness,” he sent out to Sweden 
and procured some birds—one lot in 1837, a second in 
1838, in all forty-eight individuals. From this centre 
(Taymouth) the birds have spread, and formed numberless 
fresh colonies during the last half century. 
