THE CRESTED QUAIL. 
156 
are covered with a dry hard herbage, with low bushes, and suffers per- 
petually from the curse of drought. The country we are describing is, 
however, a country of the most marvellous contrasts. The mountains 
of wildest aspect enclose charming valleys, well-watered, and always 
green and fertile; great forests of pine and cedar alternate with 
desolate fields of lava ; the hill-slopes bloom with oaks, mezquitos, 
and manzanitos; while along the banks of rippling water-courses run 
long lines of walnut trees, poplars, and willows, intermixed with an 
apparently impervious network of wild vines, thorns, roses, and other 
climbing plants. 
This is the home of the crested quail. 
" Beautiful to see," exclaims the enthusiastic naturalist, " soft to 
touch, sweet to smell, succulent to the palate, he is, in very truth, a 
raAdshing bird. I have admired him from the day when I saw him 
first, impaled upon a plank ; but now that I have been able to observe 
him living, and in his native home, I admire him still more : and, in 
my opinion, no American bird equals him in beauty. His full and 
rounded forms exclude all idea of heaviness ; he has a long neck and 
tail ; his head is small ; the feathers which crest it, elegantly bending 
backward, invest him with an incomparable grace. His gait is light 
and easy. The male bird, which moves majestically, with head raised, 
eyes glittering, and crest agitated, is a superb sight ; and not less so 
when he mounts on the prostrate tree, under which his family lie 
concealed. Such a bird has equal attractions for the naturalist, the 
artist, the hunter. But he has yet another advantage, — the agreeable 
savour and pleasant flavour of his flesh render him dear to the 
gourmand." 
The common quail has no pretensions to vie with his Californian 
congener in beauty of shape and plumage, but, whether he be the 
" quail " of Scripture or not, he is excellent eating. He is a graceful 
little creature, not much larger than a lark, and in shape and colouring 
very like a partridge. The Greeks esteemed him for his sweet voice, 
though his song is little more than a somewhat shrill call, like the 
notes of a flageolet. One of our old dramatists refers to him : — 
