THE SCRUB QUAIL. 107 



rally rise singly, or quickly one after the other, and never, 

 like partridges at home, in coveys. 



The best season's quail-shooting I ever knew was when 

 my old mate Kendall, or " the old boy," as we called him, 

 shot on the heather at Picnic Point, about twelve miles 

 south of Melbourne. He bagged 1,500 couple of quail 

 on one ground in the season ; but he had miles to shoot 

 over. Twenty-five couple per day was his general bag ; 

 he averaged eighteen birds out of twenty shots, and he 

 used to work at it day after day, like any other kind of 

 labour. But he certainly was the best shot I ever saw 

 take a gun in hand (and I have shot by the side of " the 

 Squire " and other good men), and there was scarcely 

 his equal in the colony in beating for game. He shot 

 to a couple of little mongrels, the smallest a bobtailed 

 terrier, about 5 Ibs. weight, and" Johnny " rarely passed 

 over a quail. I never used setters or pointers in quail- 

 shooting ; our dogs were up to every kind of bush-work, 

 from driving a kangaroo to hunting for quail. Of course 

 there are plenty of well-bred setters and pointers out 

 here, and we generally see the best dogs in the hands of 

 men who use them least ; but the Melbourne sportsmen 

 can now, as the advertisement runs, have " their dogs 

 broke as they ought to be, by a Leicestershire sportsman," 

 at 5. 5s. per head. 



The common quail is found on one of the New Zealand 

 islands, but I believe there is no snipe in that country. 



The Scrub Quail, or, as we called it' in the bush, the 

 partridge quail, is the largest of all the species, with a 



