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harvest has commenced, for the following reason : the national laziness shows itself in the Arab 

 husbandman, who prefers reaping as he sits ; Quails fly low ; and his head, hardly visible above 

 the crop, is in danger of receiving the sportsman's charge. I never attempted to make any great 

 bag ; but I have frequently shot ten brace. The biggest bag I heard of was eighty brace to one 

 gun, or rather to one sportsman with two guns, at Cairo. The neighbourhood of Cairo is very 

 good ; indeed it would be hard to particularize any place which is not good at the right time ; 

 but on the whole we nowhere got better shooting than in the plains of Thebes, right up to the 

 very colossi. Without a dog you must expect to lose a third, unless your native is very expert 

 in marking them. By the middle of April the migration was all past. On the 12th we killed 

 thirteen brace: that was the last day we made a bag. After that they became just as scarce as 

 they had been in the Delta in January. That some stay the summer to breed is certain ; and it 

 would appear that a few nest in the winter or early spring ; for on the 22nd of March I flushed 

 an early ' squeaker ' able to fly, which must have been hatched some weeks. I never saw any 

 others. I conclude the natives occasionally catch them for their own consumption, as I was now 

 and then brought a snared one. In Hasselquist's time they netted them in Lower Egypt." 



The food of the Quail is very similar to that of the Partridge ; but it feeds more on small 

 seeds and on insects than that bird. It eats the seeds of numbers of weeds of various sorts and 

 of different sorts of grasses, and various insects, such as flies, grasshoppers, cicadas, ants, and 

 so-called ants' eggs, small coleoptera, and leaf-insects. It feeds during the night and early in 

 the morning and late in the evening, seldom, if ever, during the day, when it remains at rest in 

 some convenient cover. Like many of its allies it is fond of dusting itself and scratching in the 

 dry soil, frequently reclining on its side to sun itself. 



The call- or pairing-note of the male bird is well known wherever this bird is found in the 

 breeding-season. It consists of a short prelude, harsh and deep, resembling the syllables rowow, 

 after which comes the loud shrill picwirwic or pickernic, which is so well known to the peasant, 

 who hails it as a forerunner of the harvest. Naumann tells us that the German peasant says 

 the Quail utters the words " Biicke dich" (stoop), or " Buck' den Ruck " (bend your back). The 

 female never utters the second shrill note, but only sometimes, when under intense sexual 

 excitement, calls rowow. During the heat of the day the call of the Quail is scarcely ever 

 heard, but usually in the evening, during fine still weather, and throughout the night to late in 

 the morning, and most often in the months of May and June. Besides the above pairing-call 

 both sexes have a note with which they call each other, resembling the syllables beebewe; and 

 when suddenly flushed and alarmed they utter a note tril-reck-reck-reck, which, however, is not 

 very loud. 



The Quail is both monogamous and polygamous ; for in some parts they are found paired, 

 the male contenting himself with one mate, whereas in others he will have more than one. 

 Few birds are so ardent and intensely amorous ; and this ardent nature of the Quail has given 

 rise to various superstitions or curious stories amongst the ancients. When a male in the height 

 of amorous passion meets a female he will tread her time after time, not unfrequently, it is said, 

 as often as nine or ten times in succession ; and if she proves coy to these advances, will attack 

 and ill use her, sometimes even killing her. Moreover, the male Quail is extremely pugnacious, 

 and will attack any other male who comes within the district or piece of ground of which he has 



