COMMON QUAIL. 465 
able to run and follow their parents almost as soon as they are hatched, 
and they quickly learn to pick up and search for their own food. Only 
one brood is reared in the year. As soon as the young are capable of 
taking care of themselves the family party appears to be broken up, and 
the birds are solitary in their habits until the time of migration arrives. 
The resident birds in this country are never found in coveys like Part- 
ridges, and are usually flushed singly from the cover. The Quail seems 
very much attached to its haunts, appearing in them regularly ; and Dixon 
has known an instance of several pairs of these birds having been turned 
out, and though always absent in winter, their well-known call unfailingly 
proclaiming their presence in the district the following summer. 
The Quail may almost be regarded as a miniature Partridge; and the 
two species resemble each other so closely in the pattern of their coloration 
that it is difficult to believe that they can be generically distinct. The 
general colour of the adult male Quail in spring plumage is buff. The 
cheeks are chestnut, and the chin and throat are nearly black. The crown, 
back, rump, and upper tail-coverts are barred with dark and light brown, 
and behind each eye is a buff streak. Pale shaft-lines form a mesial line 
on the crown, and are conspicuous on the back, scapulars, innermost 
secondaries, the sides of the rump, and flanks. Bill, legs, feet, and claws 
brown. Ivides hazel. The female differs from the male in having the 
chin and throat pale buff, and the breast and flanks profusely spotted with 
very dark brown. After the autumn moult the colour is retained on the 
chin and upper throat, but the chestnut on the cheeks and the dark brown 
of the lower throat is moulted into buff. Males of the year resemble 
females, but have very few spots on the breast. In what appear to be 
males in first spring plumage the chin and throat, as well as the cheeks 
and ear-coverts, are chestnut. In examples which are probably males in 
their second spring plumage, the dark brown on the chin and throat is 
confined to the centre. The fully adult plumage does not appear to be 
attained until the third spring. Immature males have the flanks richly 
spotted as in the female. 
Several attempts have been made to naturalize the Virginian Colin 
(Ortyx virginianus) both in England and in Scotland, but none of them 
have proved successful. Some ornithologists have introduced this bird 
into the British list on the strength of examples thus imported, which 
have been shot in various parts of the country. It is a resident in the 
Eastern States of North America, extending northwards into South Canada 
and westwards into Texas, being subject to some local variation in colour, 
which has given rise to its being divided into several subspecies. In 
its general appearance this bird is intermediate between a Quail and a 
Partridge, but is very different from either, and in America it is called by 
both these names. 
VOL. II. 2H 
