The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-12-22
QUAIL THICK IN MANY YIELDS.

0s~NSSN ~-N~
 from the Carolinas.
 With a vast majority of the men who love dog and gun, the whirring quail furnishes the theme for the most cherished reverie. Naturally, all other game birds have their firm supporters, but one must go into the everlasting hills and rocks for grouse, the swamps and tangle for the woodcock, and the low marshes for the rail and snipe-all of which have their drawbacks. The quail alone reigns supreme in fair hunting country, and surely no other game furnishes such admirable op- portunity for the intelligent pointer and setter to do their best work.
 All these things combine to make the quail, or as he is often commonly called the partridge, the chief source of de- light to the vast army of people who annually spend their vacations a-hunt- ing. To hunt them, and even to find them. is one thing;to bring them to bag, however, is a decidedly different pro- position, and on a general average the quail beats the shooter much more fre- quently than the shooter beats the quail. It requires firm hand, quick eye, to grass quail in the bush, and even in the open he is no slouch though he does not fly like a streak of greased lightning, as the mateur so often SUD- poses he does.
 Birds are reported abundant every where this season. These reports have been borne out in part throughout the nearby State fields and New Jersey, but it remained for the first returning shooters from Southern grounds to make known the existence of a quail Klondike. Everywhere through Mary land, Virginia, the Carolinas, and, need less to say, Georgia stories of thousands of quail are borne out by the huge strings being brought in by returning parties. Virginia however, is closed against quail shooting, and will be until Jan, 27, unless the Legislature, when it meets in December shall pass a law resembling the present restric- tions.
 It is but few steps further into the Carolinas, and there lies the shooting, according to all reports, not the two covey a day, scattered birds in the cat
 brier kind which so often vexes sports men hereabout, but birds in plenty and in stretches of splendid open shooting country that insures chance to follow the covey and participate in the de- lights of stopping singles as stanch dog locates them. All over North Caro-
 lima the birds are said to be more abundant than for a dozen years, and
 there are no favorite localities so far as
 quantity of game is concerned. Good grounds, too, are plentiful, and from
 all the little towns near High Point. Statesville, Charlotte Marion Chapel Hill, Newton, Oxford, Durham, Win
 ston, Salem, Jamestown, and thou
 sand other places come reports that
 show how well the famous old grounds
 must be populated with quail.
 The quail is a peculiar little fellow, | not stunning the habitation of man by any means, in fact he will often live | close around the barnyards and if un-
 molested pick food with the domestic ! fowl So long as the weather stays | warm and the woods furnish an abund-
 ance of insect life and concealment, the quail keep to cover, and this accounts l for many hunters being unable to find | them early in the season.
 | As the Winter draws near and the
 natural process of nature dries the | seeds of the field-weeds, the quail
 seek the stubble for their food and then
 comes the time of good shooting. If the | day be cloudy they will play around in | the weeds all day and only seek the cover of woods and thickets when | alarmed, but on bright sunny days they I keep to the shadow of the woods, except when feeding. The reason for this is good from the quail standpoint. On \ bright days the hawks, their natural | enemy, can see them very, readily in the fields, and as he is always ready | for quail dinner it is not healthy for | the quails to be caught wandering about when the light is good.
 | When not constantly chased the quail will lay well to the dogs and the shoot ] ing is not by any means difficult. The 1 birds start with a whistle and whirr that startles the novice but is only 1 music for the veteran, and once on | their way they go straight. Still as
 long as men and dogs hunt quail more will be missed than killed and all be- | cause the vast majority or skirters
 think the birds fly with the velocity of 1 cannon lIs-Philadelphia Press.