282 THE PARTRIDGE. 



ensues. The male gives the first signal of alarm, by a peculiar ciy 

 of distress; throwing himself at the same moment more immediately 

 into the way of danger, in order to mislead the enemy. He flutters 

 along the ground, hanging his wings, and exhibiting every symptom 

 of debility. By this stratagem he seldom fails of so far attracting 

 the attention of the intruder, as to allow the female to conduct the 

 helpless, unfledged brood into some place of security. " A Partridge 

 (says Mr. White, who gives an instance of this instinctive sagacity) 

 came out of a ditch, and ran along shivering with her wings, and 

 crying out as if wounded and unable to get from us. While the 

 dam feigned distress, a boy who attended me saw the brood, which was 

 small and unable to fly, run for shelter into an old fox -hole, under 

 the bank." Mr. Marwick relates, that " once as he was hunting with 

 a young Pointer, the dog ran on a brood of very small Partridges, 

 The old bird cried, fluttered, and ran tumbling along just before the 

 dog's nose, till she had drawn him to a considerable distance; when 

 she took wing and flew further oft', but not out of the fiel-i. On this 

 the dog returned nearly to the place where the young-ones lay con- 

 cealed in the grass ; this the old bird no sooner perceived than she 

 flew back again, settled just before the dog's nose, and a second time 

 acted the same part, rolling and tumbling about till she drew off' his 

 attention from her brood, and thus succeeded in preserving them." 

 This gentleman says also that, when a Kite was once hovering over a 

 covey of young Partridges, he saw the old birds fly up at the ferocious 

 enemy, screaming and fighting with all their might to preserve their 

 brood. 



The eggs of the Partridge are frequently destroyed by "Weasels, 

 Stoats, Crows, Magpies, and other animals. When this has been the 

 case, the female frequently makes another nest and lays afresh. The 

 produce of these second hatchings are those small birds that are not 

 perfectly feathered in the tail till the beginning of October. This is 

 always a puny, sickly race, ; and the individuals seldom outlive the 

 rigors of the winter. 



It is said that those Partridges which are hatched under a domestic 

 hen, retain through life the habit of calling whenever they hear the 

 clucking of hens. 



The Partridge, even when reared by the hand, soon neglects those 

 who have the care of it ; and, shortly after its full growth, altogether 

 estranges itself from the house where it was bred. This will almost 

 invariably be its conduct, however intimately it may have connected 

 tself with the place and inhabitants in the early part of its exist- 

 ence. Among the few instances of the Partridge's remaining tame, 

 was that of one reared by the Rev. Mr. Bird. This, long after its 

 full growth, attended the parlor at breakfast and other times, received 

 food from any hand that gave it, stretched itself before the fire, and 

 seemed much to enjoy the warmth. At length, it fell a victim to that 

 foe of all favorite birds, a cat. 



On the farm of Lion nail, in Essex, belonging to Colonel Hawker, 

 a Partridge, in the year 1788, formed her nest, and hatched sixteen 

 eggs, on the top of a 'pollard oak-tree. What renders this circumstance 



