3 30 Unexplored Spain 



He will search hundreds of acres for a problematical hare, and a 

 long day's hunt with his trusty 'pachdn is amply rewarded by a 

 couple or two of diminutive rabbits about half the weight of ours, 

 but whose speed verily stands in inverse ratio. For the life of 

 the Spanish rabbit is passed in the midst of alarms ; supremely 

 conscious of soaring eagles and hawks overhead, he never willingly 

 shows in the open by daylight, or if forced to it, then terror lends 

 wings to his feet. The death of a hare, however, represents to 

 the cazador the climax of terrestrial triumph. In those ecstatic 

 moments the animal (average weight 4^ lbs.) is held aloft by 

 the hind -legs, a subject for admiration and self-gratulation ; 

 mentally it is weighed again and again to a chorus of soliloquising 

 ejaculations, " Grande como un chivo" = as big as a kid ! 



The quail, though extremely abundant at its passage-seasons 

 (when in September the Levante, or S.E. wind, blows for days 

 together, blocking their transit to Africa, Andalucia is crammed 

 with accumulated quails), yet represents but a small morsel in a 

 culinary sense, and is swift of wing to boot. Neither of these 

 attributes commend its pursuit to our friend with the rusty single- 

 barrel ; and similar reasons bear, with increased force, on the case 

 of snipe. These game-birds are left severely alone — that is, with 

 the gun. 



Bags of twenty brace of quail (and in former years of forty or fifty 

 brace) may then be made where, on the wind changing next day, never a 

 quail will be found. 



In spring, again, great numbers pass northward, but many remain to 

 nest on the fertile vegas of Guadalquivir and on the plains of Castile. 

 At that season quail are chiefly taken by nets ; but on systems so 

 cunning and elaborate that we regret having no space for descriptive 

 detail. Put briefly, in Andalucia the fowler spreads a gossamer-wov^en 

 fabric loosely over the growing corn ; then, lying alongside, by means of 

 a pito (an instrument that exactly reproduces the dactylic call-note of the 

 quarry) induces every combative male within earshot either to run 

 beneath or to alight precisely upon the outspread snare. So perfect is 

 the imitation that quail will even run over the fowler's prostrate form in 

 their search for the adversary. In Valencia living call-birds (hung in 

 cages on poles) are substituted for the pito, and the net is more of a 

 fixture — small patches of the previous autumn's crop being left uncut 

 expressly to attract quail to definite points. 



The Andalucian quail frequents palmetto-scrub and is very local — 

 rarely can more than two or three couple be killed in a day, and that 



