GAME BIRDS, GULLS, ETC. 107, 
almost incredible. At certain seasons when, for 
some mysterious reason, it makes its appearance in 
numbers unusually great, the turnip-fields are stripped 
as cleanly of every green leaf as though a veritable 
flock of locusts had passed over them. Nothing is 
left but the bare skeletons of the former plants, to 
most of which are clinging a mass of black, many- 
The Partridge. 
footed grubs, to whose insatiable appetites the scene 
of desolation is due. And thus, by the havoc of a 
few short days, labour, time, and money may be 
wasted, the soil exhausted without yielding a due 
return, and dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of 
labourers left without employment. 
