TETRAONID^. 271 



Falmouth, and says a bevy of sixteen were reared on Mr. Aledlyn's estate 

 at Lower Spargoe a few years since. 



The Quail has been compared to a miniature Partridge, but it differs 

 from that bird in being sometimes polygamous. The male has a shrill, 

 whistling call-note, which is repeated three times in quick succession, hence 

 the specific name " dad i/Uso nans " given it by Meyer. This note we have 

 frequently heard in the spring and early summer when walking about 

 Bishop's Lydeard, in West Somerset. In a road passing through that 

 village a dead Quail was picked up in December, and it is not rare to meet 

 with examples of the Quail in the winter months. Such birds were 

 believed by Col. Montagu to belong to a late brood. Xests with eggs have 

 been occasionally found at the end of August, and the young birds which 

 would be produced from the in could not be ready to depart with the 

 migrating birds at the end of September. Most of those obtained in 

 winter are in poor condition, and instances are not rare of single birds 

 being at that season found lying dead in the fields. In severe weather, 

 when snow is on the ground, Quail must be much pressed to find suffi- 

 cient sustenance ; they then appear to cuddle together in the snow, 

 keeping in the same spot for days together, making no search for food. 



"W'e drove with a friend one clay in late autumn to a farm on the coast, 

 near Bridgwater, where, in the course of a short afternoon, we secured 

 seven varieties of game : Partridge, Pheasant, Quail, Land-Rail, Snipe, 

 Hare, and llahhit ; and if we could have had an hour longer to have gone 

 down to a small marsh, we should have probably added Teal and Wild 

 Duck to our bag. 



The Quail is, with justice, regarded by the gourmet as the most delicious 

 of all the birds upon the game-list. 



Family TETRAONID^. 

 [Red Grouse. Lagopus scoticus (Lath.). 



" A single specimen of this bird was shot on Dartmoor in October a 

 few years since by Mr. Newton, iu whose collection it remains. I am 

 also informed by Mr. C. Trideaux, of Dodbrook, that a female of the same 

 species was shot near Stokenham a few years since by !Mr. Case (on the 

 estate named Franco), in whose possession it now is " (E. M., Howe's 

 Peramb. Dartmoor, 1st od. 1848, p. 231). 



Ptarmigan. Lafjopus mutus (Montin). 



" A single siiCfiuK'n of lliis ])ird, in summer plumage (l), was also shot 

 on Dartmoor in October by Mr. Newton, who still has it iu his museum " 

 (E. M., liowe's I'eramb. Dartmoor, Iht ed. Ls48, j). "J'M ). 



If no mistake was made, it is not a little remarkable that Mr. Newton, 



