Bob Whites, Grouse, etc. 



the amiability of the female extend to sharing her nest with a 

 rival, or are all these eggs hers ? Remove an egg, and it is im- 

 possible for the human hand to rearrange the clutch with such 

 faultless economy. In the middle and southern states, where two 

 and even three broods have been reared in a season, the number 

 of eggs laid at a time rarely exceeds ten, so that the autumn 

 coveys there are no larger than those in the north. Both parents 

 take turns in covering the eggs, the male encouraging his brood- 

 ing mate by cheerful, musical whistles introduced by a half-sup- 

 pressed syllable, that the New Englanders translate into No more 

 wet! more wet! or Pease most ripe! most ripe! and the West- 

 ern farmers into Sow more wheat! more wheat! A shrill wee- 

 teeh, used as a note of warning ; quoi-hee, quoi-hee, to reassemble 

 a scattered covey ; a subdued clucking when undisturbed, and a 

 rapidly repeated twitter when surprised, are Bob White's vocal 

 expressions. One feels happier for having heard his exuberant 

 joy and pride whistled from a fence-rail or low branch of a tree. 

 How readily he answers the farmer's boy whistling to him from 

 the plough ! He is decidedly in evidence, bold and fearless during 

 the twenty-four days of incubation ; but one rarely sees the female 

 then. She is ever shy. Ray, the English naturalist, says the 

 European quail hatches one-third more males than females — a 

 proportion that corresponds with the numbers generally bagged 

 by our gunners. Should the eggs be handled when first laid, 

 the nest is at once deserted. Mowing machines work sad havoc 

 every year. 



Precisely as a brood of chickens follows a mother hen about 

 the farm, so a bevy of comical little downy Bob Whites, some- 

 times with the shells still sticking to their backs, run about 

 through the tangled brake and cultivated fields, learning from both 

 devoted parents which seeds of grasses, cereals, and berries they 

 may eat. Farmers bless them for the number of weed-seeds and 

 insects they destroy. The fox and the hawk, next to man, are their 

 ■ worst enemies. A note of alarm sends the fledgelings half-running, 

 half-flying, to huddle up close to the mother; or when a cold wind 

 blows, a soft, low, caressing twitter summons the babies to shelter 

 beneath her short wings, that barely cover the large brood. 



Later, the young scatter and hide among the grass, while 

 the parents, feigning lameness and the usual pathetic artifices 

 familiar to one who has ever disturbed a family of young birds, 



263 



