Cover is naturally eschewed when wet. They often trust to their powers of foot for escape, or crouch motionless upon soil that matches their plumage, while the whirring noise with which they rise is familiar to all, as is their heavy rapid {225}flight at starting, and their easy gliding motion afterwards. The well-known crowing note is most commonly heard towards evening. The nest, a circular cavity lined with grass, is placed among short herbage, often near a road, the drab-coloured–or, exceptionally, bluish–eggs varying from nine to twenty or more in number. Both parents tend the young and employ many devices to mislead an intruder; at night the family parties roost upon the ground, and later in the year pack into larger coveys. The methods of sportsmen and poachers cannot be discussed at length in our limited space, but the general adoption of driving, instead of shooting over dogs–due to improved systems of farming–should not be left unnoticed. _P. daürica_ (_barbata_), of Asia east of the Altai and Tian-shan Ranges, exhibits lanceolate feathers on the sides of the throat, like _Coturnix japonica_, and a black "horse-shoe" mark on the golden-buff breast; the latter part in _P. hodgsoniae_, of South Tibet and the extreme north of India, being white with wide bars and a large basal patch of black; _P. sifanica_ of North-West China and North Tibet lacks the black patch, and has less black on the sides of the head and throat. The two last-named birds reach the snow-line at about eighteen thousand feet; the first of them at least having a nest and eggs like the Common Partridge. _Rhizothera longirostris_, of the Malay Peninsula, Borneo, and Sumatra, has long sharp curved beak and powerful whitish metatarsi, provided with a pair of stout spurs in each sex. The upper plumage is rich brown with black and buff markings; a grey shade pervades the neck and lower back, and chestnut tints the cheeks, throat, and wings; the under parts are grey, merging posteriorly into buff. The hen has a chestnut fore-neck, and is less grey above. _R. dulitensis_ of Borneo is similar.