04

A Day With a Partridge Family

Ernest Thompson Seton

Perhaps you have thought that the wild creatures of the woods and fields do nothing all day but eat and frisk carelessly about. But their lives are quite different from that. When they are still very young, they begin to learn how to find food and how to hide from their enemies. This story tells how some baby partridges, toddling after their mother, met with a dangerous adventure.

HOW MOTHER PARTRIDGE FOOLED THE FOX

Down the side of Taylor's Hill Mother Partridge led her baby chicks toward the meadow and the sparkling brook. The little partridges were only one day old, but hey were already quick on foot, and their mother was aking them for the first time to drink.

Mother Partridge walked slowly, for the woods were full of enemies. From her throat came a soft cluck. It was a call to the little balls of down who came toddling after her on their tinypink legs. They peeped softly if they were left even a few inches behind. There were twelve of them, but Mother Partridge watched them all, She also watched every bush and tree, and the whole woods, and the sky itself.

Always this mother was looking for enemies, and an enemy she found when she reached the edge of the wooded slope. Across the meadow she could see a fox. He was coming toward her and her brood, and in a few moments would be close enough to catch their scent in the wind. The mother partridge knew that there was not a minute to lose.

“Krrr! Krrr! ”(Hide! Hide! )cried the mother in a low voice; and the tiny partridges, hardly bigger than acorns and only one day old, scattered a few inches apart to hide. One hid under a leaf, another ran between two roots, a third crawled into a hole, and so on, until all were hidden but one. This one could find no hiding-place; so he squatted on a broad, yellowish brown chip of wood and lay very flat and still. Then he closed his eyes tight, feeling sure that now he was safe from being seen. And he was nearly right; for he looked almost like the chip itself. One by one the little partridges stopped their frightened peeping, and all was still.

Mother Partridge did not wait for the fox to reach the spot where her twelve little ones were hiding. This wise mother flew straight toward the beast and dropped a few yards to one side of him. Then she flung herself on the ground, flopping as though lame—oh, so lame—and whining like a puppy. By pretending that she was lame, she was going to lead Mr. Fox away from her babies, and then fly away from him herself.

Delighted to see a partridge beside him, the fox sprang at the bird. But when he was almost sure he had caught her, she flopped just a foot or so out of his reach.

He followed with another jump and would have caught her this time surely, but somehow a little tree came between them, and the partridge dragged herself away and hid behind a log. He snapped his jaws and boundedover the log, while she made another forward jump and tumbled down a bank. The eager fox almost caught her tail, but, strange as it seemed, the faster he ran and leaped, the faster she seemed to go.

To the fox it was more than surprising! He could hardly believe that in five minutes he, the swift-footedfox, had not caught a bird whose wing appearedto be injured.

Mother Partridge seemed to get stronger as the fox followed swiftly. After a quarter of a mile of racing—that was all away from Taylor' s Hill—the bird suddenly rose with a whirr and flew off to some thick bushes that lay at quite a distance from the hill. Then the fox knew that he had been made a fool of, and walked away.

Mother Partridge flew back to the little fuzz-balls she had left hidden in the woods. She went to the very grass-blade she had last stepped on. There she stood for a moment, pleased at the perfect stillness of her children. Even at her step not one of them stirred. The little fellow on the chip only closed his eyes a tiny little bit harder, till the mother said:

“K-reet! ”(Come, children! )At once every hiding-place gave up its little baby partridge. The wee fellow on the chip opened his eyes and, with a sweet little“peep, peep, ”ran to his mother. Then all the other tiny balls of down joined in the peeping, and were very happy.

WHAT MOTHER PARTRIDGE TAUGHT HER BABIES

The sun was hot now, and there was an open place to cross on the way to the water. So the mother spread out her tail like a fan, and gathered the little things in the shadow under it. In this way she kept off all danger of sunstroke until they reached the bushes by the stream.

Here a cotton-tail rabbit leaped out and gave them a great scare. But he was an old friend; and one of the many things the little partridges learned that day was that Bunny always wants to live in peace with his neighbors.

And then came the drink—the purest of running water. At first the little fellows didn' t know how to drink, but they watched their mother, and soon learned to drink as she did. There they stood in a row along the edge of the brook, twelve little brown-and-golden balls on twenty-four little pink-toed feet, with twelve sweet little golden heads bowing and drinking.

Then Mother Partridge led her brood to the meadow. Here there was a great grassy hump, which she had seen some time before. This was an ant' s nest. The mother stepped on top of it, and then gave half a dozen rakes with her claws. The ant-hill was broken open and its insides scattered.

At once the ants swarmedout. Some ran around the hill, while a few of them began to carry away fat, white eggs. The old partridge, coming to her children, picked up one of these juicy-looking eggs and clucked. Then she dropped it, picked it up again, and clucked, and finallyswallowed it.

The young ones stood around, watching. Then one little fellow—the one that had sat on the chip—picked up an ant-egg, dropped it a few times, and then swallowed it; so he had learned to eat. Within twenty minutes even the smallest partridge had learned. And a merry time they all had scrambling after the eggs which their mother sent rolling down the sides of the ant-hill. Soon every young partridge had swallowed so many eggs that he could eat no more.

Then the mother led her children up the stream. On a sandy bank, well hidden by bushes, they lay all that afternoon. They learned how pleasant it was to feel the cool dust running between their hot little toes. They lay on their sides as their mother did and scratched happily with their tiny feet.

That night Mother Partridge took her little ones to a dry thicket near by. There, among the dead leaves and under the bushes, she covered them with her soft feathers. The wee cuddling things peeped in their sleep and snuggledagainst her warm body.