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descended in this instance, as, after all the pains bestowed, the description is only that of an individual. The tail is pure black beneath, considerably paler at tip and on the undulations of the middle feathers. The tarsus is three quarters of an inch long; the feathers with which it is covered, together with the femorals, are pale grayish ochreous, undulated with dusky; the toes are dusky, and the nails blackish.

The male is but little larger, and entirely, but not intensely black. We can, however, say very little about it, having taken but a hasty and imperfect view of a specimen belonging to Mr Sabine of London, and writing merely from recollection. The tail-feathers are wholly black, perfectly plain and unspotted; and in the female and young, they are but slightly mottled, as is seen in almost all grouse. Mr Sabine has long had this bird in his possession, and intended dedicating it, as a new species, to that distinguished traveller, Dr Richardson.

43. TETRAO PHASIANELLUS, LIN..

SHARP-TAILED GROUSE.

BONAPARTE, PLATE XIX. — EDINBURGH COLLEGE MUSEUM.

THIS species of grouse, though long since said to inhabit Virginia, is, in fact, a recent acquisition to the Fauna of the United States; for it was only through an awkward mistake that it was ever attributed to that country. Mitchell, upon an inspection of Edward's bad drawing of this bird, mistaking it for the ruffed grouse of that and the neighbouring states, declared it to be an inhabitant of Virginia; and upon his authority Edwards gave it as such. This statement, however, led Wilson into the erroneous belief of the identity of the two species, in which he was farther confirmed, when, after the most careful researches, he became satisfied that the ruffed grouse was the only species to be found in Virginia.

The gallant and lamented Governor Lewis gave the first authentic information of the existence of this bird

within the limits of these States. He met with it on the upper waters of the Missouri, but observes, that it is peculiarly the inhabitant of the great plains of the Columbia. He states also, that the scales, or lateral processes of the toes, with which it is furnished in winter, like the rest of its genus, drop off in summer.

Say introduced the species regularly into the scientific records of his country. The expedition under Major Long brought back a specimen now in the Philadelphia Museum, from which, though a female, and unusually light coloured, we have taken our description, on account of its having been procured in the American territory. The bird is never seen in any of the Atlantic states, though numerous in high northern latitudes. It is common near Severn River and Albany Fort, inhabiting the uncultivated lands in the neighbourhood of the settlements, and particularly near the southern parts of Hudson's Bay, being often killed in winter near Fort York; but it does not extend its range to Churchill. Near Fort William, on Lake Superior, the sharp-tailed grouse is also found in spring, and we have seen specimens killed in winter at Cumberland House, and others at York Factory in summer. In collections it is very rare; and Temminck, when he wrote his history of gallinaceous birds, had never seen a specimen, nor did it exist at the time in any European museum.

It is by the shape of the tail that this grouse is eminently distinguished from all others. The English name which we have, with Mr Sabine, selected from Pennant, is much more applicable than that of longtailed, given by Edwards; for instead of being long, it is, except the middle feathers, remarkably short, cuneiform, and acute, more resembling that of some ducks than of the pheasant. By the elongated feathers, but in no other particular, this species approaches the African genus Pterocles. At Hudson's Bay it is called pheasant, a name which, though inappropriate, seems, at least, better applied to this than the ruffed grouse.

The original writers that have mentioned this grouse are, Edwards, who first introduced it, and has figured

the female from a badly stuffed specimen, being, how ever, the only figure before ours; Pennant; Hearne, who has given the most information concerning its habits, derived from personal observation; and Forster, who has described it with accuracy. Linné at first adopted it from Edwards, but afterwards most unaccountably changed his mind, and considered it as a female of the European cock of the woods. It was restored by Latham and others to its proper rank in the scale of beings.

The sharp-tailed grouse is remarkably shy, living solitary, or by pairs, during summer, and not associating in packs till autumn; remaining thus throughout the winter. Whilst the ruffed grouse is never found but in woods, and the pinnated grouse only in plains, the present frequents either indifferently. They, however, of choice, inhabit what are called the juniper plains, keeping among the small juniper bushes, the buds constituting their principal food. They are usually seen on the ground, but when disturbed, fly to the highest trees. Their food in summer is composed of berries, the various sorts of which they eagerly seek: in winter they are confined to the buds and tops of evergreens, or of birch and alder, but especially poplar, of which they are very fond. They are more easily approached in autumn than when they inhabit large forests, as they then keep alighting on the tops of the tallest poplars, beyond the reach of an ordinary gun. When disturbed in that position, they are apt to hide themselves in the snow; but Hearne informs us, that the hunter's chance is not the better for that; for so rapidly do they make their way beneath the surface, that they often suddenly take wing several yards from the spot where they entered, and almost always in a different direction from that which is expected.

Like the rest of its kind, the sharp-tailed grouse breeds on the ground near some bush, making a loose nest with grass, and lining it with feathers. Here the female lays from nine to thirteen eggs, which are white spotted with blackish. The young are hatched about

the middle of June; they utter a piping noise, somewhat like chickens. Attempts have been repeatedly made to domesticate them, but have as constantly failed, all the young, though carefully nursed by their stepmother, the common hen, dying one after another, probably for want of suitable food. This species has several cries: the cock has a shrill crowing note, rather feeble; and both sexes, when disturbed, or whilst on the wing, repeat frequently the cry of cack, cack. This well known sound conducts the hunter to their hiding place, and they are also detected, by producing with their small, lateral, rigid tail-feathers, a curious noise, resembling that made by a winnowing fan. When in good order, one of these grouse will weigh upwards of two pounds, being very plump. Their flesh is of a light brown colour, and very compact, though, at the same time, exceedingly juicy and well tasted, being far superior in this respect to the common ruffed, and approaching in excellence the delicious pinnated grouse. The adult male sharp-tailed grouse, in full plumage, is sixteen inches long, and twenty-three in breadth. The bill is little more than an inch long, blackish, pale at the base of the lower mandible, and with its ridge entering between the small feathers covering the nostrils: these are blackish, edged with pale rusty, the latter predominating; the irides are hazel. The general colour of the bird is a mixture of white, and different shades of dark and light rusty, on a rather deep and glossy blackish ground, the feathers of the head and neck have but a single band of rusty, and are tipped with white; those, however, of the crown, are of a much deeper and more glossy black, with a single marginal spot of rusty on each side, and a very faint tip of the same, forming a tolerably pure black space on the top of the head. The feathers between the eye and bill, those around the eye, above and beneath, on the sides of the head, and on the throat, are somewhat of a dingy yellowish white, with a small black spot on each side, giving these parts a dotted appearance; but the dots fewer and smaller on the throat. The feathers of

the back and rump are black, transversely varied on the margin and at tip, with pale bright rusty, sprinkled with black, forming a confused mixture of black and rusty on the whole upper parts of the bird; the long loose-webbed upper tail-coverts being similar, but decidedly and almost regularly banded with black, and sprinkled with rusty, this colour being there much lighter and approaching to white, and even constituting the ground colour. The breast is brown, approaching to chocolate, each feather being terminated by a white fringe, with a large arrow-shaped spot of that colour on the middle of each feather, so that, when the plumage lies close, the feathers appear white with black crescents, and are generally described so. On the lower portion of the breast, the white spots, as they descend, become longer and narrower, the branches forming the angle, coming closer and closer to each other, till the spot becomes a mere white streak along the shaft, but, at the same time, the white marginal fringe widens so considerably, that the feathers of the belly may be properly called white, being brown only at their base, but the shaft is white even there, with no more than a brown heart-shaped spot visible on the middle. The heart-shaped brown spots of the belly become so very small at the vent, that this part appears pure white, with a few very small blackish spots; the long flank feathers are broadly banded with black and white, somewhat tinged with ochrous exteriorly; the under tail-coverts are white, blackish along the shafts, and more or less varied with black in different specimens, which also vary considerably as to the size and shape of all the spots, being in some more acute, in others more rounded, &c. The wings are eight inches long, the third and fourth primaries being the longest; the scapulars are uniform with the back, but, besides the rusty sprinkling of the margins and tip, the largest have narrow bandlike spots of a pure bright rufous, a slight whitish streak along the shaft in the centre, and a large white spot at the end. The smaller wing-coverts are plain chocolate brown; the spurious wing, and

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