THE AMERICAN QUAIL. 
Odontophoride. 
Of true partridges belonging to that family of galli- 
naceous birds known as Perdicide there are none in 
America, but their place is taken by another family, 
known as Odontophoride, which has a wide distribu- 
tion, with a number of species in the United States, and 
a still greater expansion to the southward. 
While the grouse are all large birds, some of them 
approaching the wild turkey in size, the American par- 
tridges, or quails as they are commonly called, are all 
small. The grouse have the lower legs and feet more 
or less covered with hairlike feathers, and the nostrils 
also covered with points of feathers reaching out on to 
the bill, known as antiz. The grouse have over the 
eye a naked strip of skin which in the breeding season 
becomes to some extent enlarged and congested, so that 
it is sometimes loosely spoken of as a comb, though it 
is not a comb like that of the common hen. The Ameri- 
can partridges on the other hand have the feet and 
nostrils naked, lack the bare skin above the eye and 
usually have short tails. The character which distin- 
guishes them from the partridges of the Old World 
(Perdicide) is found in the cutting edge of the mandi- 
ble, which is toothed or notched. Sometimes this char- 
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