THE QUAIL. 43 



as in the torrid zone. It seems to adapt itself to each climate 

 where it resides. In the countries within the arctic circle, it is 

 brown in summer, but in winter changes its colour to white ; 

 and it acquires a new covering of soft warm down, which at 

 that season grows underneath its feathers. The wisdom and 

 goodness of the Author of Nature are exceedingly conspicuous 

 in this particular, — that in the polar regions all animals acquire 

 a covering perfectly adapted to the rigours of the climate, — a 

 circumstance which shows that the providential care of the 

 Creator extends to all his creatures, in every situation. The 

 habits of these birds resemble in general those of the rest of 

 the poultry kind; but they seem to possess a superiority of 

 cunning and instinct. Being accustomed to hostile aggression, 

 they learn from necessity and habit the arts of evasion and the 

 means of safety. The partridge commonly produces a covey of 

 ten or fifteen young. It is said that this bird lives twenty years ; 

 but it is seldom suffered to die of old age. 



The affection of partridges for their young, and the artifices 

 they occasionally employ for their protection, are equally singu- 

 lar and interesting. " A partridge," says Mr. White, in his 

 Natural History, " came out of a ditch, and ran along, shivering 

 with her wings, and crying out, as if wounded and unable to get 

 from us : but while the dam feigned this distress, a boy who at- 

 tended me saw the brood, which was small and unable to fly, 

 run for shelter into an old fox's hole under the bank." Mr. 

 Markwick also relates, that as he was once hunting with a 

 young pointer, the dog ran on a brood of very small partridges. 

 The dam immediately cried, fluttered, and ran trembling along 

 before the dog's nose, till she had drawn him to a considerable 

 distance ; when she took wing, and flew farther off, but not 

 out of the field. The pointer then returned nearly to the place 

 where the young ones lay concealed ; upon which the old bird 

 flew back again, and repeated her artifice of rolling and tumbling 

 about before the dog's nose, till she succeeded in diverting his 

 attention, and thus preserved her helpless progeny. 



Of partridges, there are more than twenty species ; all of 

 which may, however, be arranged in two grand divisions, the red 

 and the grey : the former is the largest, and often perches on 

 trees ; the latter, whirth in England is the most common, always 

 sits on the ground. To give any description of a bird so gen- 

 erally known, would be superfluous ; and no one is ignorant of 

 the excellency of the food which its flesh affords. 



THE QUAIL 



Is much smaller than any other of the gallinaceous tribes, 

 being not more than half so large as the partridge, although 



