202 
BIRDS. 
10 or 15 acres under cultivation, two pairs were seen in 1869, 
and, in the autumn of that year, Mr Hardcastle killed 
16 brace. About the year 1877 there was only one pair 
in the district, and even these birds were not seen every 
year. From Tongue Mr. Crawford writes us, under date 
March 17, 1884 : "Partridges are extinct (at Tongue) since 
the severe winter of 1879; I have only seen one solitary 
bird since then." 
But in 1886 Mr. Savile G. Eeid marks them as local in 
the north-east of Sutherland, and gives Eibigail and Betty- 
hill as localities for a few coveys. This only shows how 
climatic changes promptly have effect upon bird-life locally, 
and is an argument in favour of a more extensive appre- 
ciation, and a wider application, by naturalists, of the same 
natural law of causes and effects. We again uphold our 
fixed opinion that such fluctuations are distinctly deserving 
of special attention, and that the causes are in many cases 
distinctly subject to detection. 
Fairly plentiful through all the cultivated districts of the 
county (0. MSS., 1868). 
256. Coturnix communis (Bonnaterre). Quail. 
Has occurred on the east coast on several occasions between 
Brora and Dornoch. A deserted nest was obtained by 
Sheriff Mackenzie in September 1873 ; there are also 
specimens in the Dunrobin Museum. As early as 1830 the 
quail is noted as occurring, being included in a list of birds 
given in A Tour through Scotland, p. 151, as seen there in 
the then keeper's house at Dunrobin. Several nests have 
been found about the same district. 
Mr. Osborne mentions a pair of these birds which bred on the 
farm of Ulbster, near Wick, in 1860, twelve eggs having 
been laid and hatched. Two young birds and the old cock 
