GAMBEL’S QUAIL 103 
his ditty at such times is a medley of odd notes, sound- 
ing rather lugubrious than hilarious, but it is presum- 
ably satisfactory to the one most concerned. So the 
long days pass, for two weeks or more, till feeble cries 
come from the nest; the mother dries and cuddles the 
curious little things, and the delighted birds, brimful of 
joy, lead their family off in search.of food. 
“From the number of eggs sometimes found in a 
nest it becomes a question whether birds, hard pressed, 
may not occasionally deposit in nests not their own. 
We have no positive evidence that it may occur, but 
observation has rendered it highly probable, and such 
is the case with some other birds, as the rails andi, I 
think, the Virginia quail. However this may be, it is 
pretty certain that broods of young sometimes coalesce 
at a varying time after hatching. I do not remember 
to have myself seen a covey of more than twenty, but 
it is currently reported upon good authority that troops 
numbering as many as fifty partly grown birds, and 
including several old ones, may be met with. This 
raises, of course, the question of polygamy, so common 
in birds of this order, and something may be said in 
favor of the view. The same surmise has been made 
in the case of L. californicus, but I believe it remains 
to be proven. I am bound to observe that I have never 
witnessed anything supporting this view. . . . 
“Man is, I suppose, the quail’s worst enemy; what 
the White does with dog and gun the Red accomplishes 
with ingenious snares. The Indians take great num- 
bers alive in this way, for food or to trade with the 
