266 GROUSE, SNIPE, QUAIL, WOODCOCK, ETC. 



in a nest. I have often counted twenty-six in a bevy — 

 two old ones and twenty-four young birds. 



The flight of the American quail is short. They 

 seldom fly more than four hundred yards when flushed, 

 and are easily marked down. They have one very 

 singular attribute. After being first flushed, and then 

 only, they are able to retain their scent, and your 

 pointers, or setters, may range over and all around them, 

 j_^s without discovering the birds. If they are trampled up, 

 or by any means put once again to flight, this singular 

 quality no longer remains to them. This speciality is 

 enjoyed by no other game bird with which I am 

 acquainted. 



At first I was much puzzled by this curious fact. I 

 was, perhaps, the first man* who introduced or used 

 pointers in Texas, and shot small game in English 

 fashion ; and although this singularity was well known, 

 and had been frequently discussed by northern sports- 

 men in magazines and newspapers in the Atlantic 

 States, I had not then read about it, or even heard of it, 

 and it was not until long after I had satisfied myself 

 that the quail possessed this remarkable peculiarity that 

 I saw it stated in Porter's ' Spirit of the Times,' in 

 the department of the paper headed, ' Fur, Fin, and 

 Feather,' then edited by the late Henry William 

 Herbert (' Frank Forester '). 



For the benefit of any of my fellow-sportsmen who 

 may follow in my steps, I shall relate my first day's 



