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204 STOJilES ABOUT BIRDS. 



THE QUAIL. 



When the children of Israel were wandering in the wilderness, and were fed 

 by manna from heaven, they murmured for flesh to eat ; and we arc told that 

 quails were sent in such quantities that " feathered fowls were like the sands 

 of the sea. So they did eat, and were well filled : for He gave them their 

 own desire." 



There has been a great deal written by learned men about this miraculous 

 flight of quails, and to what species they belonged. And it is interesting 

 to know that the bird in the picture is thought to be of the very same 

 family. It is the only species of quail that ever takes long journeys, or flies 

 in large flocks. And old writers tell many stories of the vast quantities of 

 quails that were sometimes seen flying from place to place. Indeed, one of 

 these writers declares that the birds sometimes settled on a ship in such 

 numbers as to sink her ! 



Whether this be true or not — and it sounds rather like a fable — the 

 quails have been seen in our own days in certain countries flying in countless 

 numbers. At the proper season, the islands in the Archipelago are covered 

 with them. And the bishop of one of these islands, near Naples, derived the 

 chief portion of his income from the quantities of birds that were caught on 

 his island, and he was actually called the " Bishop of Quails." 



And on the western coasts of the kingdom of Naples as many as a 

 hundred thousand are taken in one day. 



These monster gatherings of the quails are in the spring, when they pass 

 to the northern parts of Europe, and in the autumn, when they go southward. 

 They arrive from Africa in thousands, we might say millions, in the month 

 of April, and spread over Europe, touching even at our own country. 



And when we think over these facts, the vast numbers of the birds, their 

 habits as birds of passage, and also their custom of flying by night, we cannot 

 but recall the words of Scripture, and appl\' them to this very bird : " And it 

 came to pass at even that the quails came up and covered the camp." 



The quails reach our shores in Ma}^, and betake themselves to the open 

 country. The male bird arrives before the female, and in France the bird- 

 catcher takes advantacre of this. He jzoes out and imitates the note of the 



