CHAPTER XXVI. 



QUAILS. 



"Come out, 'tis now September;" so runs the first line 

 of what used to be an extremely popular part song, dealing 

 with the delights of the^autumn, its harvests, its blaze of leaf 

 colour, and its sport. "St. Partridge's Day," or the first of 

 the ninth moon, has long been famous as the end of the close 

 season for Perdix cinerea, our common partridge. England, 

 Scotland, and I reland are at one in thus protecting the partridge, 

 and from 2nd February to 31st August forbid under penalties 

 the killing ofasingleoneof the family. Grouse have their close 

 season from the llth December to the llth August, but the 

 quail, with which gallant little bird we now have to deal, is 

 in England placed merely under the Wild Birds' Protection 

 Act, and this safeguards it only between the 2nd March and 

 the 31st July. Ireland, wiser in this as in some other things, 

 honours the quail with the same protection as is given to 

 larger game, from llth January to 19th September. This 

 is ample for the safety of the species, and at the same time 

 provides space enough for winter shooting. China, of course, 

 has no close time for anything, not even missionaries! So 

 far as the quaiHs concerned, our own Municipal Council has 

 been careless in its duty. It has done what it could for the 

 pheasant and the partridge, but it has left quail to the tender 

 mercies of the native pot-hunter and the miscreants who 

 support him. Doubtless the Council would reply that the 

 quail is migratory and needs no protection, but this is only 

 a partial truth. I have proved by personal observation that 

 some quail do remain in this neighbourhood throughout the 

 year. By all means, therefore, let them have just that 

 protection which the other game birds get, and which can be 

 given by a few scratches of the Secretary's pen. 



For this long digression, at the very opening, too, I 

 must apologize both to quails and to quail-lovers. But 

 forgiveness will surely be forthcoming for an effort, weak 

 though it be, to plead the cause of what is in every sense 

 of the term a game bird. Coturnix cotnmnnis, the common 

 quail, is famous alike in prose and poetry, in classics and 

 common talk, in history, in science, in the cock-pit, and the 

 pot. And he is good in all. Never, so far as I know, has a 



