UPLAND SHOOTING, 



^39 



QUAIL SHOOTING. 



HAVE already, unJer my list 

 of Upland Game, given a full 

 fscii|)tii»n of this lovely little 

 iid tVom the pas:es of Audubon 

 lul Wilson. 

 Bolli of tliese authors lean to 

 le soutliern fashion of calling 

 lis bird a Partridge. Now the 

 truth of the matter is simply tliis, that the bird in question is 

 propcrlii and accurately neither one nor the other, but a distinct 

 species, possessing no English name whatever. The ornitholo- 

 gical name of the Partridge is Perdix, of the Quail Coturnix, of 

 the American bird, distinct from either, Orfjjx. The latter ^^Hu^A^i 

 name being the Greek word, as Coturnix is the Latin word, t^ ^^^^^ ^, 

 meaning Quail. It is, of course, impossible to talk about kill- 

 ing Orfi/xes, or more correctly Ortygcs, we must therefore,' 

 perforce call these birds either Quail or Partridge. /)t fvi 



Now as both the European Partridges are considerably more 

 than double the size of the American bird, as they are never in 

 any country migratori/, and as they differ from the Ortyx in not 

 having the same woodland habits, in cry and in plumage ; while ' 

 in size, and in being a Itinl of passage, the European Quail ^i^ ^ L^^ 

 exactly resembles that of America ; resembling it in all other i. 

 respects far more closely than the Partridge proper — I canno ' '' 



for a moment hesitate in saying that American Quail is the'Hlw.*.;!^- , -■ 

 correct and proper English name for the Ortyx Yirginiana, and %ir^ilH' ^ 





/!l.^t»^vV 



h 



I conceive that the naturalists who first distin squished him from 



the Quail with which he was originally classed, sanction this *■ 



d9« 





Hw<r>.^ ■ii'.-j 



6^ nuu-i 



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