Fig. 10. 



California Quail (Lophortyx Californdca). Male in Full Plumage. Slightly Less 

 than Half Natural Size. Photo from Life by the Author. 



American Bob-White and Quails 



By DR. R. W. SHUFELDT, C. M. Z. S. 



PART IV. QUAILS OP THE GENERA Lophortyx and Cyrtonyx, 

 WITH NOTES ON THE QUAIL OF EUROPE 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS BY THE AUTHOR. 



|N SO far as authoritative works 

 upon the science of ornithology 

 are concerned, perhaps the most 

 indifferent and downright inac- 

 curate collection of quail pictures 

 extant are the ones to be found 

 in the fifth edition of the "Key to North 

 American Birds" by Elliott Coues. It was 

 surely a great pity to mar such a useful work 

 as that has proved to be by the employment 

 of figures of that character. His own draw- 

 ings of "Mr. and Mrs. Bob White" are truly 

 ridiculous caricatures of what they were in- 

 tended to represent. Fig. 508 the Bob-white 

 family carries idealism to the limit (p. 755) ; 

 the Masked Bob-white is not recognizable, and 

 the head of Gambel's quail, drawn by the 

 author, is quite incorrect. Moreover, he has 



drawn the feathers of the plume all standing 

 apart, while under Brehm's wretched figure, 

 on the very next page (Fig. 512), of the "Cali- 

 fornia Helmet Quail," he criticizes this point, 

 remarking that in life "the feathers of the 

 crest are always bundled in a bunch, not 

 standing apart, as in this figure" (p. 759). On 

 p. 760, the figure designated as "Gambel's 

 Quail" is not that bird at all, but a reproduc- 

 tion 01 a very poorly mounted specimen of 

 the California quail, the white loral stripes 

 being plainly seen. He reproduces in Fig. 511 

 the incorrect figure of Audubon of the Plumed 

 Quail. In life the feathers of the plume in 

 that species never stand far apart as there 

 represented, while it is quite incorrect in 

 other particulars. Finally, the head" of the 

 "Massena Quail" on page 762 is as absurd a 



