190 
HUFF. 
price latterly was two guineas a dozen; and Bewick records 
that in a bill brought in for a dinner at the George Inn* 
Coney Street, York, August 18th., 1791, where four Buffs made 
one of the dishes at the table, they were separately charged 
sixteen shillings. I will take the opportunity of recommending 
the house as a good old-fashioned comfortable inn, well con¬ 
ducted by the landlord, Mr. Winn, in whose family, as he 
happened to tell me yesterday, it has been for seventy years. 
The Buff is very pugnacious in its habits, that is, the male, 
in the breeding season; the female being ‘causa teterrima belli, 5 
so long since the times of Paris, of Priam, and of Troy, as 
well as so long before. In these challenges they mount on 
some little knoll, which often becomes quite trodden down by 
their feet—a tilting ground for the display of ‘Love and 
Courage. 5 At other seasons of the year* they live peaceably 
together. Even in confinement however they exhibit a most 
combative disposition, and when fed would starve if not 
separately supplied with food, quarrelling over anything like 
a common table: with other species, nevertheless, they seem 
to keep up amicable relations in confinement. 
Selbv says, that ‘their actions in fighting are very similar 
to those of a game cock; the head is lowered, and the beak 
held in an horizontal direction, the ruff, and indeed every 
feather more or less distended, the former sweeping the ground 
as a shield, and the tail partly spread, upon the whole, assuming 
a most ferocious aspect. 5 He adds, that in these attitudes, 
the combatants stand opposed to each other, attempting to 
lay hold with their bills, and if this is effected by a leap, the 
wings are then brought into offensive action. As might be 
expected from the nature of the weapons, their contests are 
not often attended by fatal consequences. This, however, does 
sometimes occur, as Montagu mentions an instance in which 
the bird died from an injury in the throat, got in one of its 
feuds when in confinement. 
They are not particularly shy in their habits. Small flocks 
of the young birds keep together in the autumn. 
Buffs are polygamous, and hence, as in other similar cases, 
their quarrelsome habits. When the eggs are laid the hen 
birds become very bold in their care, but the Buffs continue 
as shy as before. 
They feed on worms and aquatic insects. 
The Beeve begins to lay the first or second week in May, 
and the young are hatched the beginning of June. The nest 
