So the white grouse said: "One moment.

The only living things visible for miles are white grouse and wandering herds of reindeer, pawing the snow for food.

Suddenly there was a flapping of wings, and the white grouse perched on the dragon's head and said: "Can I be of any assistance?"

The Ice Dragon, or Do as You are Told The white grouse laughed, and his laugh was echoed by thousands of kind, soft bird-voices.

The varyingly white grouse of northern Europe; birds from coastal Norway are intermediate with the all dark Red Grouse of the British Isles.

Also popular is the more upmarket "Perdrix Noir" i.e. Black Grouse - run by the husband-and-wife partnership which used to manage the White Grouse.

In Thomas Bewick's A History of British Birds (1797) the species is named as "White Grouse" with alternatives "White Game, or Ptarmigan".

And off they all fluttered, and the white grouse flew off, and the sealskin dwarfs were all dead, and the fires went out, and George and Jane were left alone in the dark with the dragon!

The two most popular bars for British holiday-makers in Flaine are "le Diamant Noir" and "le White Pub" - known as "the White Grouse" before being bought out by a pair of French entrepreneurs in 2004.

Before they started the white grouse thanked them in a few pleasant, well-chosen words, and then they took a sideways slanting run, and started off again on the great slide, and so away towards the North Pole and the twinkling, beautiful lights.

So then the sportsman had to confess that he wanted the firework to kill the white grouse with; and, when they came to look, there was the white grouse himself, sitting in the snow, looking quite pale and careworn, and waiting anxiously for the matter to be decided one way or the other.