Seven miles of hard footing it and I had only the brush of a couple of red squirrels, the wing of a chicken hawk, and the lean carcass of a small rabbit to show. I had sighted a fox far out of range, and had been taken unawares by a brace of birds which Charlie had nobly flushed and I had shockingly muffed. The dog had followed the birds deeper into the wood, leaving me angry and uncertain what to do. Suddenly I heard his yelp of rage and disappointment give place to his business bark, and I knew my pup had a tree for me. It was a sound not to be mistaken. My dog never now plays spoof with me by tonguing a tree for hair. His business bark means partridge every time. I hurried on as the dog gave tongue more sharp and peremptory, taking a skirt to avoid a tangled piece of underbrush as I began-to approach the critical spot. The ruins of an old shanty lay fifty yards to my left, and between them and me was a sort of _cache_ or root cellar, the sides intact but the roof half gone. All of a sudden there broke on my ear a sound I had not heard for many a day. I listened, almost dumfounded. There it is again! And no mistaking it. It is the pipe of a quail! It came from a patch of meadow not many rods off, and it set every nerve in my body a-tingling. Charlie and his partridges were out of mind instanter. I had no manner of use for them at that supreme moment. “It's no stray bird!” I mentally ejaculated. “Perhaps it's a regular Kansas covey!” Heavens, what luck! The boys--the Judge--quail on toast--the laugh--the amazement--the consternation--I conjured all these things up in my excited brain in less time than it takes to tell it. I started forward with every fibre a-tension. I was wild to get even a glimpse of the little strangers. [Illustration: 0144] Suddenly--enough almost to puzzle me--the pipe was answered from the mouth of the old potato pit, and the next instant “whir-r-r-r!” rose the birds, and “bang! bang!” I gave them right and left at a range and with a calculation that left three only to join and tell the tale to the whistler in the meadow. Seven was the drop, and the birds were as plump and pretty as ever I had set eyes on. I fairly chuckled aloud in glee at the surprise I had in store for my club mates. I sat down, took a congratulatory nip, and actually toyed with the quail as a boy would with the first fruits of his initial day's outing with his own boughten gun! My faithful dog Charlie had during this time stuck to his birds. I could hear his angry bark growing angrier, and I could detect, as I fancied, a shade of impatience and disappointment therein. A crack at a partridge will be a change, I thought, and so I hurried in Charlie's direction. There he sat on a rotten stump, with eyes fixed on the brushy top of a dead pine.