BOB-WHITE. 
29 
to the aborigines by the name of ho-ouy (^ho-wee), which is 
also imitative of the call they sometimes utter, as I have 
heard, early in the morning, from a partly domesticated covey, 
^hen assembled in a corner and about to take wing, the 
same low, chicken-like twittering, as is employed by the 
mother towards her more tender brood, is repeated ; but 
""hen dispersed, by necessary occupation, or alarm, they are 
'■eassembled by a loud and oft-repeated call of anxious 
3-iid social inquiry. This note, 'ho-wee, is, however, so strongly 
instinctive as to be commonly uttered without occasion, by 
toe male even in a cage, surrounded by his kindred brood ; 
^0 that this expression, at stated times, is only one of gen- 
eral sympathy and satisfaction, like that of a singing bird 
nttered when solitary and confined to a cage. 
In consequence of the shortness and concavity of its wings, 
m common with most other birds of the same family the Ameri- 
can Quail usually makes a loud whirring noise in its flight, 
’^’hich is seldom long continued, always laborious, and generally 
steady as to afford no difficult mark for the expert sports- 
man. According to the observations of Audubon, the flight of 
mir Partridge and Grouse, when not hurried by alarm, is 
attended with very little more noise than that of other birds, 
atever may be the fact, when our little Partridges alight on 
ground, they often run out to very considerable distances, 
^ en not directly flushed, and endeavor to gain the shelter of 
riers and low bushes, or instinctively squat among the fallen 
wood.s, from which, with their brown livery, it is 
' cult to distinguish them. No great destruction is made 
among them while on the wing, as they do not take a general 
a arm on being approached, but rise at intervals only by two 
three at a time. 
nick I*®®” so long and so persistently called by this 
oo-ist'^Tf exalted and pedantic American Ornithol- 
fied T been constrained to approve of it, and has digni- 
morn T'V ■‘’anction, — throwing to the winds for one brief 
canon of priority,” and adopting Seebohm’s favorite 
rum plurimorum. The bird is also known as “ Quail ” in 
