The regular course of nature is in itself a series of
accidental influences; that is, the particular occasion is subservient
to a general law with which it does not seem at first sight to have
any connection. A severe winter may be sufficient to kill the quails,
just as the ancient morass was sufficient to drown the mastodon. But
the question is, why these causes began to operate just at these
times. We may as well stop with the evident fact, that the unresting
circulation is forever going on in the universe.
But if the quail, who is here very near his northern limits, has a
hard time of it in the winter, and is threatened with such "removal"
as we treat the Indians to, his relative, the partridge, our other
gallinaceous or hen-like bird, is of a tougher fibre, as you see when
you come upon his star-like tracks across the path, eight or nine
inches apart, and struck sharp and deep in the snow, or closer
together among the bushes, where he stretched up for barberries or
buds, and ending on either side with a series of fine parallel cuts,
where the sharp-pointed quills struck the snow as he rose,--a picture
of vigor and success.
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