176 WILD FOWL SHOOTING. 
could more fully tell his secret longings. What a com- 
plete transformation in my companion! Before the cry 
of the quail, he stood in the swampy ground, cautious, 
immovable and on the alert, a perfect retriever. And 
now, after he finds that the utmost freedom is allowed 
him toscent, to point, to find the gamest little bird that 
ever spread wings, he springs forward, and with impet- 
uous bound, clears bush and ditch, while ever and 
anon, he looks joyfully back as if to thank me for the 
pleasure or to chide me for moving so slowly. One of 
these halcyon days is so fresh in my mind, that I can- 
not resist the temptation to tell what Don and I saw, 
when the whistling quail coaxed us from our decoys. 
The dim, gray light of approaching day 
Warns the hunter to arise and not delay; 
For in the stubble, bushes or fence of rail, 
He will find the happy, vociferous quail. 
The quail is semi-domestic in its habits. It loves civ- 
ilization, and there is no place it likes so well as the 
sparsely-settled country, invaded by a few settlers or 
small villages, where the certain indications of rural life 
are shown by fields of wheat, barley, buckwheat, and 
the small clearings of the hardy pioneer. Around such 
places they live and rear their young. The female, 
with maternal instinct, seeks the place to rear her 
brood. She is a “squatter”” in the true sense of the 
word. When she has found a place suitable for the 
comfort of her expected family, and for her lord and 
master a home, she pre-empts the land and settles upon 
it; and the male with his life will see that her home- 
stead rights are protected. There is no establishment 
of this homestead by metes and bounds, as necessity re- 
quires tn human laws but the divine law gives them a 
