180 WILD FOWL SHOOTING. 
their heads to the blinding and drifting snow, and sit 
quietly until break of day, when they hustle out from 
their imprisonment, and set forth on their daily travels. 
At times, the snow covers them ; then comes the rain 
or sleet: the snow melts, then freezes. Alas! these 
changes are their death-knell. The frozen snow seals 
them hermetically in their beds. They struggle for 
liberty, find it impossible to regain it, and at last they 
give up in despair and creeping closely together, ignobly 
perish. Whole coveys are frequently frozen in this 
manner. In mid-winter, they brave the dangers of the 
woods, and to escape the fierce violence of the winter’s 
storm, and the piercing, bitter cold, they huddle together 
in fence corners, clumps of trees, and thick underbrush, 
where they roost at night, and at break of day are pot- 
ted by the unfeeling and implacable pot-hunter ; or, are 
seduced into captivity through the machinations of the 
bucolic youth and his figure four trap. 
With us they remain through the eutire year. Hunger 
drives them from the sequestered places in mid-winter, 
and they become partially domesticated, if left un- 
molested, and will come to the barnyard and gardens 
of the farmers, ever welcome and cheery visitors to the 
maternal wife and prattling children. Coming as they 
do, day after day, picking the corn and scattered grain 
in the farmyard, or especially favored with crumbs 
from the table, they utter their cheering call at break of 
day, and greet the early riser as he goes forth at dawn 
to tend his stock. 
I have several times called at some farmyard, and 
after pleasant greetings with the lady of the house, en- 
quired if there were any quails round. “ Yes,” she would 
reply “ we have a flock, the children and I. Have had 
