212 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING. 
are able to follow their mother. They are exceedingly 
cautious little creatures, for the moment the old bird 
sounds an alarm they scatter in every direction and 
hide in the grass until the reassuring voice of their 
guardian summons them to her side. If a dog or a cat 
approaches the brood, the mother pretends to be wounded, 
and flutters far enough ahead of it to keep out of harm’s 
reach, and when she has led it some distance away from 
them, she rises in the air with a cluck of joy and tri- 
umph, and returns to her family, which she soon gathers 
about her by endearing calls. Although the quail is 
a timid bird, yet it has been known to associate with 
the barn-yard fowl, especially in winter, and to remain 
around the outhouses of a farm for weeks at a time. Its 
eggs have also been hatched by a hen, and the chicks fol- 
lowed their foster mother until the ensuing spring, when, 
through some overpowering instinct of nature, they left 
her and sought their free companions. Instances are 
known, however, in which the birds were not only con- 
tent to remain in confinement, but also to lay eggs which 
proved fertile when hatched under a bantam hen or either 
of the parent quails. It is often rather difficult fora 
captive female to hatch her own eggs, as the male dallies 
with her so much, and uses all his powers of fascination 
to such an extent, that he frequently induces her to de- 
sert her nest, in order to prolong the love season. The 
Virginia quail has two broods in a year if the weather 
is fine and the summer long, but in the more northern 
regions it raises only one, unless the first eggs laid should 
be destroyed, and then it may try to raise another. 
While the female is hatching, her mate sits ona shrub 
or a fence close by, and whistles his soft notes of ‘‘ Bob 
White” by the hour, as if he were encouraging or com- 
forting her with words of endearment. Although the 
bird derives its ordinary name from these two notes, yet 
it has a variety of others which it uses when a bevy 
