Page:Natural History, Birds.djvu/253

240 and the Cock of the Plains of the Rocky Mountains being scarcely inferior to the Turkey in dimensions. It is thus characterized: the beak is short, very strong, and arched from the base to the tip; the nostrils are situated on each side of the base, partly hidden by an arched scale, and small close-set feathers. A naked skin above the eyes, of a bright scarlet colour; enlarging in spring. Wings short, rounded, and hollow: tail of sixteen feathers, very ample, and expanding. Feet naked, with the edges of the toes toothed; the tarsi feathered.

The dense pine-forest, the wild plain, the mountain and the barren rock, the moorland and the heath, are the resorts of the true Grouse. The northern part of our own Island, in common with the colder regions of Scandinavia and Russia, formerly produced, in considerable abundance, the most magnificent species known, the Capercailzie, or Cock of the Wood (Tetrao urogallus, .); but his size, beauty, imposing appearance, and savoury flesh long ago caused his extermination from our woods. The last specimen is recorded to have been killed in Scotland about seventy years ago. By the exertions of some of the Scottish nobility, however, this fine bird seems likely to become again a wild denizen of our northern woods. In particular, Lord Breadalbane procured from Sweden at great expense, in the year 1838 and the early part of 1839, forty-four adult Capercailzie, the majority of which were hens. A portion of these were put into a large aviary, and others turned out into the forest, and we are informed that both divisions succeeded, and that seventy-nine young birds were known to be