SAND PARTRIDGE 101 
of the cultivation, but keep exclusively to the sand 
(possibly in spring or summer they may approach 
nearer to the haunts of man, but I have no 
evidence), which makes the fact of their being, 
as it is alleged they are, exceedingly good eating, 
very remarkable, for one would be disposed to 
think they would be thin, tough, and tasteless. I 
have it on good authority, that as a game-bird 
for the table, they are far to be preferred to our 
own Partridge, being, though small, very plump 
and of a fine game flavour. All Partridges seem 
peculiar in doing well on very littlk—at home 
one often wonders during a hard winter at their 
surviving at all—for they are never fed like the 
pampered Pheasants, and not only do they survive, 
but they seem to carry as much flesh when shot 
in a hard winter as they do in September when 
grain lies scattered in profusion on every stubble. 
Although one has praised its seeming happy way 
of living, no account of this bird would be complete 
without some notice of its extraordinary pugnacity. 
This is confined admittedly to the males, but 
with them it is, as with all so-called game-birds, 
a ruling passion, of which our game-cocks are 
of course well-known examples; but it may not 
be so generally known that in many countries— 
