THE PARTRIDGE. 69 



necessity, often become quite tame, visiting the barnyards, and 

 even mixing with the poultry, to gain a scanty subsistence, which 

 not unfrequently preserves them from actual starvation. 



Besides thus falling victims to the inclemency of the weather, 

 large numbers are now destroyed, not only by the gun, but by the 

 aid of traps, nets, and other ingenious contrivances ; and we have 

 seen, in former times, the Philadelphia markets, and the villages 

 of the interior, fairly overstocked with live birds, taken in various 

 ways by the farmer-boys. 



When this is the case, it behooves every sportsman living in the 

 country, or residing in the city, to purchase all birds thus offered 

 for sale, and keep them till the breaking-up of the winter, when 

 they may be let loose upon a friend's estate, or turned out into 

 some neighborhood where he is in the habit of shooting, and 

 where, from the nature of the country, they will be apt to remain 

 during the breeding season. By pursuing this course, the pro- 

 vident sportsman will be richly repaid for all his trouble and 

 humanity, at the coming shooting season, by the number of birds 

 that will thus be produced in some favorite shooting locality, as 

 the fecundity of the partridge is extraordinary, and the coveys 

 raised from a few couples of old birds, in a favorable season, will 

 be sufficient to afford sport for several days' moderate shooting. 



PERIOD OF PAIRING. 



Partridges commence pairing in the month of March, early or 

 late, according to the state of the weather; and, even after sepa- 

 rating for the purposes of procreation, it is not unusual for them 

 to reassemble in coveys as before, provided the weather should 

 again become stormy and cold, as is often the case in our change- 

 able climate. There is no doubt but there are more male birds 

 hatched than females ; and this rather singular circumstance gives 

 rise to fierce battles between the cock birds for the possession of 

 the hens at the coupling season ; and to such extent are these 

 encounters carried that they sometimes result in the death of one 

 or both of the rival combatants. This fact is so well established 



