GLIMPSES OF WILD LIFE 177 



out of the back window and returned the clial- 

 lenge of a quail that sent fortli his clear call 

 from a fence-rail one hundred yards away. In- 

 stantly he came sailing over the field of raspber- 

 ries straight toward me. When about fifteen 

 yards away he drojDped into the cover and re- 

 peated his challenge. I responded, when in an 

 instant he was almost within reach of me. He 

 alighted under the window, and looked quickly 

 around for his rival. How his eyes shone, how 

 his form dilated, how dapper and polished and 

 brisk he looked! He turned his eye up to me 

 and seemed to say, "Is it you, then, who are 

 mocking me?" and ran quickly around the cor- 

 ner of the house. Here he lingered some time 

 amid the rosebushes, half persuaded that tlie 

 call, which I still repeated, came from his rival. 

 Ah, I thought, if with his mate and young he 

 M^ould only make my field his home ! The°call 

 of the quail is a country sound that is becoming 

 all too infrequent. 



So fond am I of seeing Nature reassert her- 

 self that I even found some compensation in the 

 loss of my chickens that bright November niglit 

 when some wild creature, coon or fox, swept 

 two of them out of the evergreens, and tlieir 

 squawking as they were hurried across the lawn 

 called me from my bed to shout good-by after 

 them. It gave a new interest to the hen-roost, 

 this sudden incursion of wild nature. I feel 

 bound to caution tlie boys a])out disturbing the 

 wild rabbits that in summer breed in my cur- 

 rant-patch, and in autumn seek refuge imder 



