PTARMIGAN. 207 
the young had been picked up, to go close to the person 
taking it, as if to demand it back again; she gathers them 
under her wings in cold and stormy weather. 
The nest, if any be formed, for sometimes the bare earth 
is laid upon, is composed of a small portion of heather or 
grass, placed in some slight hollow under a rock, stone, or 
plant, and is very difficult to be detected, ‘for,’ says Sir 
William Jardine, ‘the female, on perceiving a person approach, 
generally leaves it, and is only discovered by her motion 
over the rocks, or her low clucking cry.’ The male on the 
first sign of danger has flown off, and she thus follows him, 
the young dispersing in all directions, hiding themselves and 
laying still under any stones, tufts, or bushes. Meyer says, 
‘It is reported that the male Ptarmigan behaves very re- 
markably during the time when the female sits on her eggs, 
and that under these circumstances he will sit immoveable 
in one spot for hours together, even on the approach of 
danger; and when stationed thus near the nest he has been 
known to remain there, looking around on the landscape quite 
unmoved. As soon as the young are hatched, both parents 
become alert and busy, and towards autumn more careful, and 
finally very shy in the winter. If the weather is fine and 
sunny in winter, they are all again slow to move.’ But the 
male, it would appear, leaves the education of the young to 
the hen bird, rejoming them all again later in the season, 
and then several families pack together. 
The eggs, from seven or eight to twelve in number, of a 
regular oval form, are of a white, yellowish white, greenish 
white; or reddish colour, blotted and spotted with brown and 
brownish black. 
The male in winter is pure white, except the space between 
the bill and the eye, the feathers of which, and a few behind 
it, are black, the shafts of the quills, and the outer feathers 
of the tail, which are also deep black. length, one foot one 
inch and a half to three inches and a half; bill, blackish 
brown; iris, yellowish brown, and the membrane over it ver- 
milion red. In spring the forehead, head on the crown and 
sides, neck on the back, and nape, are marked with bands 
of brownish black and reddish yellow alternately, the former 
the broader, and all slightly tipped with white, the bands 
narrower in autumn, and turning to grey, followed by the 
white of winter. ‘Throat, deep brownish black; breast, ex- 
