62 WAKE-ROBIN 
cherry, beech, and soft maple; now emerging into a 
little grassy lane, golden with buttercups or white 
with daisies, or wading waist-deep in, the red rasp- 
berry-bushes. 
Whir! whir! whir! and a brood of half-grown 
partridges start up like an explosion, a few paces 
from me, and, scattering, disappear in the bushes 
on all sides. Let me sit down here behind the 
screen of ferns and briers, and hear this wild hen 
of the woods call together her brood. At what an 
early age the partridge flies! Nature seems to con- 
centrate her energies on the wing, making the safety 
of the bird a point to be looked after first; and 
while the body is covered with down, and no signs 
of feathers are visible, the wing-quills sprout and 
unfold, and in an incredibly short time the young 
make fair headway in flying. 
The same rapid development of wing may be 
observed in chickens and turkeys, but not in water- 
fowls, nor in birds that are safely housed in the 
nest till full-fledged. The other day, by a brook, 
I came suddenly upon a young sandpiper, a most 
beautiful creature, enveloped in a soft gray down, 
swift and nimble and apparently a week or two old, 
but with no signs of plumage either of body or 
wing. And it needed none, for it escaped me by 
taking to the water as readily as if it had flown 
with wings. 
Hark! there arises over there in the brush a soft, 
persuasive cooing, a sound so subtle and wild and 
unobtrusive that it requires the most alert and 
