We find the PARTRIDGE referred to twice in the dramas, once as part of the game in a puttock’s nest, in the passage already cited, and the second time in the encounter of wit between Beatrice and Benedick at the masked ball when she, pretending not to recognise him, heaps all manner of ridicule upon him, ending with the taunt that if he should hear what she has been saying about him,
He’ll but break a comparison or two on me; which peradventure not marked or not laughed at, strikes him into melancholy; and there’s a partridge wing saved, for the fool will eat no supper that night.[125]
The SNIPE is only once mentioned and the name is used as a contemptuous epithet. Iago, as he soliloquises after an interview with the “gulled gentleman” Rodrigo, affirms
I mine own gain’d knowledge should profane
If I would time expend with such a snipe,
But for my sport and profit.[126]
The Quail and Lapwing
The QUAIL is likewise referred to in two of the Plays dealing with Greek and Roman history. Antony, comparing his chances in life with Octavius Caesar’s, confesses to himself
The very dice obey him: if we draw lots he speeds;
His cocks do win the battle still of mine;