THE COMMON QUAIL. 75 



from both cages, indicated from a distance their " whereabouts/ 5 

 and thus saved me the trouble of making any inquiry respect- 

 ing it. 



The call of the quail, interpreted wet-my-foot^ is frequently 

 uttered from " earliest dawn to latest eve " in spring and the more 

 genial periods of the year, and during winter also may occasionally 

 be heard in the north of Ireland.f I have very frequently heard 

 it in September half an hour after sunset, and listened to what 

 seemed to be their calling and answering each other until dusk. 

 Indeed, their notes may sometimes be heard in their ordinary 

 haunts during the night. On more than one occasion in the 

 summer of 1846, quails, when flying across Belfast bay by night, 

 were heard to utter their ordinary call. 



A correspondent remarks, that there is " great variety in the 

 colour of quails' eggs, some being nearly covered with dark spots, 

 and others almost plain." So late as the 24th of September 1834, 

 a friend sprung one of these birds from its nest, and on the 9th 

 or 10th of October in the same year, he met with two broods of 

 young birds, some of which could not fly. On the 7th of Octo- 

 ber, 1845, an old email was shot near Belfast, by John Garner, 

 Esq., of Garnerville, and by his dog continuing to point near the 

 place whence it sprang, three young birds, about that number 

 of days old, were procured. One of these, together with the 

 parent, being sent by that gentleman to the Belfast Museum, 

 I availed myself of the opportunity of ascertaining the food they 

 contained. The stomach of the parent was chiefly filled with the 

 seeds of the reed (Arundo phragmitis), together with fragments 

 of stone : — in the young there were none of these seeds, but 



* In some continental countries, particularly in Holland, I have been surprised to 

 see poor quails imprisoned in miserably small cages, and hung outside the windows 

 like singing birds, apparently for their music, consisting only of the above three 

 notes. True, in London they are still more cruelly treated, though for a different 

 purpose ; — that of being fattened for the table. They are granted only sufficient 

 room to enable them to stand op and feed. 



f Yarrell remarks, that " they are said to lose their voice when the breeding 

 season is over, as they are not heard to exercise their uotcs afterwards. % 



X B. B. vol. ii. 402, 2nd edit. 



