266 MULE-HUNTING EXPEDITION. 
seeds, grass, fruit, and, when they can get no- 
thing else, they devour each other. I frequently 
got off my horse to see what a large mob 
of crickets were about. They had dragged 
down, perhaps, two or three others, and were 
one and all deliberately tearing them to 
pieces. If they meet head to head, they rush 
at each other and butt like rams, but, backing 
against each other, they iash out their hind-legs 
and kick like horses. What becomes of them 
when they die I cannot imagine; the entire at- 
mosphere for miles must become pestilential. I 
suppose, from their coming in such vast numbers 
every fourth year, that the larvae must take that 
time ere they assume the perfect shape. 
May 16th.—The Californian quail, which [found 
most plentiful along the course of the Sacramento, 
ceases at the edge of this great sandy desert; it 
appears to be the limit to its northern range. 
I note a singular instance, how curiously and 
readily birds alter their usual habits under dif- 
ficulties, in the nesting of Bullock’s Oriole. A 
solitary oak stood by the little patch of water, a 
spring that oozed, rather than bubbled, through 
the sandy soil where my camp stood; it was the 
only water within many miles, and the only tree 
too; every available branch and spray had one 
