16 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE PARTRIDGE 
clean farming prevailed stubbles had ceased to be 
what they once were, a dwarf jungle; but they still 
afforded capital cover for partridges, and gave pointers 
and setters at once a chance and a use. Nowadays, 
however, we may search parish after parish in all the 
best arable counties before we find a good old- 
fashioned stubble, and if one by any accident exists, 
no sooner are the gleaners out than the wheat- 
haulmers are in, and autumn culture destroys all the 
hopes of the sportsmen.’! This mournful picture 
requires to be discounted by many other considera- 
tions. 
The partridge is more at home, no doubt, on 
highly tilled land than where the soil is poor, anda 
warm open country supplies many of its needs; but 
it has never been exclusively a bird of the homestead. 
True, it is always ready to take advantage of improve- 
ments, and thrives best where the soil is rich and 
genial ; yet it has a marked partiality for moorland 
and mixed cover—some of the prettiest partridge- 
shooting over dogs is still afforded by unreclaimed 
heaths and mosses. ‘Moor partridges are wild-bred 
birds, which have been brought out on the moors, 
which are separated, in our southern counties, only 
by a splashed bank from the cornfields. Having been 
"Quarterly Review, 1873. 
