Now the blackcock occupies to some extent an intermediate position between these two types of pheasant life, though it inclines on the whole to that first described. It is a polygamous bird, and it differs most conspicuously in plumage from its consort, the grey-hen, as may be seen from the very names by which they are each familiarly known. Yet, though the blackcock is handsome enough and shows evident marks of selective preference on the part of his ancestral hens, this preference has not exerted itself largely in the direction of bright colour, and that for two reasons. In the first place the blackcock does not feed upon brilliant foodstuffs, but upon small bog-berries, hard seeds, and young shoots of heather, and it is probable that an æsthetic taste for pure and dazzling hues is almost confined to those creatures which, like butterflies, hummingbirds, and parrots, seek their livelihood amongst beautiful fruits or flowers. In the second place, red, yellow, or orange ornaments would render the blackcock too conspicuous a mark for the hawk, the falcon, or the weapons of man; for we must remember that only those blackcocks survive from year to year and hand down their peculiarities to descendants which succeed in evading the talons of birds of prey or the small-shot of sportsmen. Feeding as they do on the open, they are not protected, like jungle-birds, by the shade of trees. Thus any bird which showed any marked tendency to develop brighter or more conspicuous plumage would almost infallibly fall a victim to one or other of his many foes; and however much his beauty might possibly charm his mates (supposing them for the moment to possess a taste for colour), he would have no chance of transmitting it to a future generation. Accordingly, the decoration of the blackcock is confined to glossy plumage and a few ornamental tail-feathers. The grey-hen herself still retains the dull and imitative colouring of the grouse race generally; and as for the cocks, even if a fair percentage of them is annually cut off through their comparative conspicuousness as marks, their loss is less felt than it would be in a monogamous community. Every spring the blackcock hold a sort of assembly or court of love, at which the pairing for the year takes place. The cocks resort to certain open and recognised spots, and there invite the grey-hens by their calls, a little duelling going on meanwhile. During these meetings they show off their beauty with great emulation, after the fashion with which we are all familiar in the case of the peacock; and when they have gained the approbation of their mates and maimed or driven away their rivals, they retire with their respective families. Unfortunately, like most polygamists, they make bad fathers, leaving the care of their young almost entirely to the hens. According to the veracious account of Artemus Ward, the great Brigham Young himself pathetically descanted upon the difficulty of extending his parental