THE QUAIL. 
137 
French naturalist :—“ One may get an idea of the prodigious number of victims 
which the simple crossing of the Mediterranean costs the species, by two well- 
known and often-quoted facts. The Bishop of Capri, a wretched islet scarcely a 
league in length, which lies at the entrance of the Bay of Naples, used to clear 
a net revenue of 25,000 francs a year (£1,000) by his Quails. This sum 
represents 150,000 Quails at the lowest computation. In certain islands of the 
Archipelago, and parts of the coast of the Peloponnese, the inhabitants, men 
and women, have no other occupation during two months of the year than 
that of collecting the Quails which are showered on them from heaven, 
picking and cleaning them, salting them, and packing them away in casks for 
transportation to the principal markets of the Levant; that is to say, the 
migration of Quails is to this part of Greece what the migration of herrings 
is to Holland and Scotland. The Quail-catchers arrive at the shore a fortnight 
in advance, and every man numbers his ground to avoid disputes. The Quail 
arrives in France early in May, and takes its departure towards the end of 
August.” 
With us it arrives about the same time, and departs in October; but it 
frequently breeds here, and we have known one come to the window opening on 
a lawn along with the ordinary garden birds to be fed with crumbs during a 
severe winter. Of the migratory birds the males, as usual, arrive first, and betray 
themselves by their thrice-repeated whistle. The fowler can then lure them towards 
his snares by a Quail-pipe for producing the note of the female. It is occasionally 
done by the voice, but this demands a very skilful performer. 
The Quail is polygamous, and the female’s nest, which is little more than a hole 
scratched in the ground, generally in some field of young wheat, contains in this 
country from six to twelve or fourteen bluish-green eggs, blotched occasionally 
with duller specks. On the Continent so many as eighteen or twenty have been 
found. When the young are hatched, the mother bird brings - * them up and finds 
food for them without any help from her mate, the bevy following her as a covey 
of partridges are protected and fed by the hen bird. 
The Rock Quail of the Deccan is a very prettily marked species, much used 
by the natives for Quail fights. Its flesh is perfectly white. In America another 
species, the ortyx , replaces our familiar bird. Its best-known representative is the 
Virginian Quail, which is of the same size as our bird, but distinguished by a 
pure white chin and broad line of black which spreads over the eye and surrounds 
the throat. It is commonly called the Partridge in America much as its 
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