18 GAME AND ITS PROTECTION, 



nated grouse, from September fii-st — and quail from 

 November first — to the same period, both days in- 

 clusive ; for wood-duck from August first till they 

 migrate southward. It is desirable to fix upon an- 

 niversaries or days that are easily remembered. 

 Woodcock are often young and weak in early sum- 

 mer, and the three days gained between the first 

 and the fourth of July are quite an advantage. 

 Although the first brood of quail may be fully 

 grown in October, a vast number of the birds are 

 too small, and the brush is too dense and thick 

 before the first of the ensuing month ; whereas it 

 is simply monstrous to slay pinnated grouse, put 

 up by the panting, overheated pointer from the 

 high grass of the western prairie, in the month of 

 August, ere they can half fly. But the migratory 

 birds of the coast — the waterfowl and snipe, the 

 waders and plovers^may continue to be shot when 

 they can be found, till their rapidly diminishing 

 numbers shall compel a more sensible and consider- 

 ate treatment. 



The bay-snipe lead the advancing army of the 

 game birds that have sought the cool and secluded 

 marshes of Hudson's Bay and the Northern Ocean 

 to raise their young, and are hastening south fi-ora 

 approaching cold and darkness to more congenial 

 climes. Next come the beautiful wood-duck, and, 

 almost simultaneously, the English snipe ; then the 

 swift but diminutive teal ; after him the broad-bill 

 or the blue-bill of the west ; and then a host of 

 other ducks, till the hardy canvas-backs and geese 



