162 Clark, Domestic A fairs of Bob-ivkiie. Ta"'' 



runways for small birds and quadrupeds beneath their green cover, 

 and often a nice nesting place for Madam White, as I have several 

 times observed in the passing years. This year circumstances 

 detained the mowing till Tuesday, the fifth day of August. I 

 hesitate somewhat from fixing this as the exact date as I had no 

 interest at the time nor any thought of the subsequent interest 

 involved. I know it was Tuesday and am strongly impressed with 

 its correctness. Early in the afternoon I took a walk up the road 

 to inspect the progress of my employee and found him skillfully 

 clipping away the weeds and shrubbery that had sprung up by 

 the roadside. Almost his first casual remark was, " There is a 

 quail's nest in the shrubbery the other side of the road." A 

 quail's nest, thought I, pretty late in the season for Bob-white to 

 set up domestic affairs. But my curiosity led me to the spot and 

 a little inspection. Old Bob sprang up out of the shrub with 

 startling whir of wing and dropped into a small growth of bush a 

 few rods away. The nest was built in a scrub of blueberry bushes 

 that had been cut about ten inches from I he ground year after 

 year, interwoven with the annual growth of grasses and weeds 

 pertaining to a wayside. The nest was a neat little bower, deftly 

 woven, covered and concealed. Only a few steps away was the 

 public road with teams, pedestrians and even dogs passing every 

 hour of the day. But little recked Bob-white in his cozy nest 

 for, as I have already intimated, it was Old Bob had possession 

 and twelve, clean, white eggs. A moment's inspection sufficed to 

 satisfy my curiosity and I quietly withdrew to avoid any possible 

 diversion in the domestic affairs of the White family. 



It was about this time, or shortly after, in crossing a field a few 

 rods back of this nest, I was startled to find myself in the midst of 

 a flock of young birds, juvenile Bob-whites about the size of an 

 English Sparrow, upspringing on every side and scurrying in 

 every direction, evidently proud of their ability to take wing, 

 though of little use would that be to protect them from old Tabby's 

 paw had she been in my place. What attracted my special atten- 

 tion was the fact of only one old bird being with the flock of little 

 ones and that bird a female Bob-white. I would add further that 

 this flock was observed several times in the following weeks and 

 always with one solitary guide and protector, and that one the 

 mother. 



