QUAILS. 221 



poet expressed his opinion of it in the following beauti- 

 ful stanza: 



" Where can you fiud a nicer thing, 

 Than shooting quail upon the wing ; 

 That's the way to pass your life, 

 Free from care and worldly strife." 



Comment upon this poetic effusion was interrupted by 

 the entrance of the host Avith a tray of steaming glasses, 

 tilled with a generous quantity of applejack and hot 

 water, in his hands. These received promj)t attention, 

 until it was time to retire. We were up early the next 

 morning and at work m the field soon after sunrise. 

 The birds laid better to the dogs than on the iirevious 

 day, and the consequence was that we had much more 

 amusement and a larger bag. We staid in that place 

 four days, and though we bagged specimens of nearly every 

 species of bird indigenous to the prairie at that season, 

 our greatest haul was among the quails. We averaged 

 about twelve brace a day, and we should have done bet- 

 ter if we had cared to work from sunrise to sunset. 



I have been out with men who killed from thirty 

 to sixty brace of quails in a day, but such shooting 

 soon satiated them, for it was more like work than 

 amusement, and slaughter than sport. A manly, gen- 

 erous soul may feel somewhat like a hungry man at 

 a feast, when he first gets into a good game resort, 

 and try to get all he can, but if he has the instinct 

 of a true sportsman his better nature soon rebels 

 against the slaughter and forces him to give it up 

 in disgust. If he makes only moderate bags, he is 

 satisfied with his work and himself, and ready to take 

 the field at any time; but if he kills for the sake of mak- 

 ing a big score, the labor becomes disagreeable. I once 

 spent a week on the prairie Avith a party of four, and 

 though we shot every day, we always had an appetite for 

 our work the next morning, simply because we were not 



