384 WHETHER POLYGAMOUS. [CHAP. x. 



Coturnix, the first species is that wherein the outer 

 quill feather is the longest. I have found this character 

 invariable in all the species; always coinciding with 

 other differences less easy to seize : in short, in con- 

 nection with the manner of life and the habits of the 

 different species of these two genera."* 



Temminck, as is usual with him when he reasons 

 from his own observations and does not adopt the no- 

 tions suggested to him by others, makes the identity of 

 appearance of the common Quail throughout its wide 

 range over Europe, Asia, and Africa, an argument for 

 the permanency of the forms stamped upon organic 

 beings at their first creation. " In Europe," he says, 

 " we have but one single species of Quail, which equally 

 belongs to Africa and to Asia, two climates very dif- 

 ferent in temperature from the cold and temperate 

 countries of Europe, but under whose influence the 

 Quail has experienced no sort of alteration in the 

 colours of its plumage a fact which, supported by so 

 many others of the same nature that are often men- 

 tioned in this work, is a new incontestible proof that 

 the temperature of the atmosphere, and the combined 

 influences of air and light, do not operate with so much 

 efficacy upon the colours of the plumage of birds and of 

 the fur of animals, as Buffon and many other naturalists 

 pretend." 



Most books tell us that the Common Quail is poly- 

 gamous, which may perhaps be correct. Temminck 

 says, " Bechstein seems not to believe in the polygamy 

 of this bird, but I believe that he is wrong." We, how- 

 ever, vote on the side of Bechstein, having been quite 



* See also Col. Sykes's Paper on the Quails and Hemipodii of 

 India in the Transactions of the Zoological Society of London. 



