QUAIL. 191 
he states that six were killed at Oulton a few years 
previously.? 
The year 1893 was remarkable for the influx of 
Quails, and birds nested in many places in the Cheshire 
lowlands. Dr. Dobie says they were frequently heard 
in fields adjoining the Dee Cop, and were reported 
from Saughall and Aldford.2 In September, Mr. Delves 
L. Broughton came across a bevy, out of which four 
young birds were shot, at Doddington ;* and in the same 
month Mr. R. Nunnerley shot two birds out of a bevy 
of three on Mossley Moss, Congleton. In the autumn of 
this year Colonel Dixon obtained a Quail at Withington, 
and informs us that others were seen in that neighbour- 
hood. In the valley of the Mersey the bird was par- 
ticularly abundant. During May and June, Mr. J. J. 
Cash repeatedly heard birds calling at Northenden, 
Baguley, and Ringway, and in the water-meadows near 
Sale. Speaking of a visit to the last locality on June 
11th, he says:—‘In the river-meadows this evening a 
considerable number of Quails called simultaneously ; 
so many, indeed, that I would have found it difficult to 
distinguish the individual notes. No one passing along 
the river-bank could fail to be struck by the incessant 
and curious call-notes of the bird to-night.’ He adds 
that he obtained satisfactory evidence of the occurrence 
of the Quail during the summer at Ashley, Bramhall, 
Tabley, and Delamere. On May 24th, a farm-servant, 
who with Mr. Cash was listening to a bird calling in 
a field near Northenden, said that one summer about 
twenty years before, the ‘ But-for-Buts’ frequented that 
field, but that he had seen none since. This would 
1 Field, vol. lx. p. 407. 1882. 
2 Dobie, op. cit. p. 330. 
8 Field, vol. lxxxii. p. 491. 1893. 
