Gambel's Partridge 399 



see exactly nothing, but hear another burst of 

 wings from what is now behind you. You wheel 

 once more just in time to see nothing, but from 

 the next mesquite ahead there comes a roar from 

 a dozen pair of wings, making a dim, blue haze 

 through the green that is gone before you can 

 turn the gun upon it. Then as suddenly all 

 is still in all the vast tangles of branches and 

 feathery green around you. You thrash with the 

 gun the branches of a huge mesquite that droop 

 along the ground, but nothing moves. You go 

 to the other side and repeat the thrashing, when 

 out of the side you just left whizz a dozen wings. 

 You make a quick shot at the first bluish haze 

 you see through the green, but on the other side 

 you look in vain for a feather, and conclude that 

 if any shot got through that mass of limb and 

 twigs it was too much exhausted to do any busi- 

 ness that day. 



You then decide to utilize the tenderfoot to 

 hammer on one side of a tree while you stand 

 ready on the other. A very good scheme, but as 

 you take your position your presence sends a half- 

 dozen birds buzzing out of the top of a mesquite, 

 and so close to the head of the tenderfoot that 

 you dare not shoot. Meanwhile another bird 

 whips out of the bottom of the clump of mes- 

 quite, scuds around out of your sight, and then 

 rises into flight in a line with its heaviest mass. 



