64 PARTRIDGE. 



Partridges are strictly monogamous : when pairing has once taken place, it is for life. 



The flesh of the Partridge is delicately flavoured, and although you find most other 

 Game Birds objected to by some individuals, it is rare to see any one refuse to partake 

 of this excellent bird; indeed the general good qualities of the Partridge, as a bird for 

 the table, are almost proverbial, and gave rise to the old couplet, 



"If the Partridge had the Woodcock's thigh, 

 'T would be the best bird that e'er did fly." 



The habits of the Partridge lead it to frequent the more open cultivated parts of the 

 country; it is especially fond of corn-fields while the plant is growing, for there it has 

 ample shelter; and after the corn is cut it picks up a good deal of its food in the 

 stubbles, thereby rendering the farmer good service. The modern practice of mowing 

 the wheat leaves a much shorter stubble, and consequently less cover for the birds. 

 Wheat stubbles are preferred by them to barley stubbles ; though these latter are by no 

 means despised. The colour of the Partridge assimilating so closely as it does to that 

 of a stubble-field, they readily secrete themselves, even in large covies, in the furrows, 

 and behind clods. During the time of harvest, when the corn-fields are full of men and 

 horses, they resort to the neighbouring fields, returning to feed in the evening, and also 

 in the early morning, to the corn-fields. In the winter, when the stubbles are ploughed 

 up, they betake themselves more to the rough meadows, where clumps of grass and mole- 

 hills exist. Potato-fields and turnips are also very favourite resorts, and they may very 

 frequently be found in them when not feeding in the stubbles. They will even be found 

 sometimes in copses where there is underwood of brambles, fern, and coarse grass. Unless 

 greatly disturbed, covies will keep pretty nearly to the same localities, whether for 

 feeding or resting, and hiding. 



The Partridge never perches on trees, being essentially a ground bird. It runs with 

 great velocity; but when suddenly alarmed, it usually either squats very close, or else 

 flies off at once. Its flight is tolerably quick, and must be familiar to most people. 

 After rising to a moderate height, which it does in an oblique, and not in a perpen- 

 dicular direction, it at once makes off in a straight course, quickly flapping its wings, 

 which produces a sound ■well known to every sportsman, and which may be compared 

 to the word 'whirr,' with the 'r' indefinitely prolonged, as whirr-r-r-r-r-r-r-r. During its 

 flight, it will, occasionally, and particularly towards its termination, cease flapping its 

 wings, and sail on with steady pinions for some distance, ending at last in a sidelong 

 manner. 



During the winter months Partridges will sometimes, especially in wild districts, pack 

 like Grouse. We remember while shooting in December, 1841, at Hatfield, in Lincoln- 

 shire, seeing a pack of about forty : they were extremely wild and wary. It was said 



