THE LADIES MAGAZINE OF GARDENING. 
297 
and could not help remarking the great share of instinct possessed by 
both the mother and her chicks for self-preservation, exhibited by the 
exercise of cunning and deception. 
Partridges are bold, courageous birds, and will fight and drive birds 
thrice their size. If a crow alights near their brood, he is instantly set 
upon by the old birds, and with such fury that the crow is quickly com¬ 
pelled to retreat. And if a flock of rooks alight in the same field, and 
near a full-feathered covey, the whole, led on by the parents, with elevated 
tails and ruffled feathers, attack the rooks with such determined impetu¬ 
osity that they are glad to retire. 
The Quail ( T. coturnix ).—This is a summer visitor, and breeds with us 
occasionally, but they are never plentiful. They resemble the partridge in 
shape and general colour, and are also very like them in manners; and 
even excel them in pugnacity, though only half their size. This pro¬ 
pensity of the quail has been encouraged by sporting gamblers in many 
countries, but nowhere so generally, nor is the sport of fighting quails so 
ardently followed, as it is in China. For there it is no uncommon thing 
for a gambler to risk one thousand dollars on the issue of a battle between 
two game quails! The sport is said to be less cruel than that of fighting 
cocks, merely because the combatants are so diminutive ; but this circum¬ 
stance can be no palliation of the inhumanity of pitting two gallant- 
spirited little animals to pull each other to pieces. Quails are kept in 
cages by bird-fanciers and poulterers in this country, mostly procured from 
the Continent, and sold for adding to the luxuries of city feasts. 
The Skvlark, emphatically so called because all the most happy and 
joyous part of the bird’s life is spent in the air high above the earth, even 
in the regions of the clouds, or as Shakspeare has it, at 66 heaven’s gate.” 
And though they sometimes sing perched on a clod on the ground as they 
do in a cage, yet their exertion to be heard produces a quivering con¬ 
vulsion of their whole frame, showing that vibration of the wings seems 
to be necessary to mark the time or divisions of the strains. This lark 
makes a nest on the ground, and generally on open commons where furze 
or other low bushes grow ; the nest is never fully exposed, but just within 
the margin of a low bush. Nor is the nest easily found, except by those 
well acquainted with their manners, the entrance being much narrower 
than the nest itself. The latter is pretty substantial, formed of slender 
bents on the exterior, and with hair and other soft matters within. They 
lay four or five, rarely six, roundish-shaped eggs, of a dull white colour, 
thickly speckled with dark brown and black, especially at the larger end. 
The nests are not readily found until the young are hatched, and then, as 
the old ones are incessantly flying to and from the nest, watching their 
