covey

Etymology 1

From Old French covee (Modern French couvée), from Latin cubō (“lie”).

noun

1. A group of 8–12 (or more) quail.
   Like when you quail huntinʼ and itʼs getting dark and you can hear the boss bird whistlinʼ tryinʼ to get the covey together again. 1952, Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man, Penguin Books (2014), page 55
2. A brood of partridges, grouse, etc.
3. A party or group (of persons or things).
   The store is on a corner about which coveys of ragged-plumed, hilarious children play and become candidates for the cough drops and soothing syrups that wait for them inside. 1906, O. Henry, The Love-Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein
   A covey of grey soldiers clanked down the platform at the double with their equipment and embarked, but in absolute silence, which seemed to them very singular. 1982, Lawrence Durrell, Constance (Avignon Quintet), Faber & Faber, published 2004, page 736

verb

1. (intransitive) To brood; to incubate.
   [Tortoises] couvie a whole yeere before they hatch Book 9
   There is a duck called the raft duck, because it is so numerous, coveying together in "whole rafts." 1869, Florida. Commissioner of Lands and Immigration, Florida: Its Climate, Soil, and Productions, page 108

Etymology 2

cove + -y

noun

1. (Britain, slang, dated) A man.
   'Pooh!' said he, 'you are as easily wounded as an unfledged dove — don't mind what an old covey like me says — I understand it all.' 1846, Justin Jones, The prince and the queen; or, Scenes in high life
   There vas an old covey as lived in Wapping, at the time I'm telling you of, who vas connected vith us by ties of common interest. 1850, Waldo Howard, The mistake of a life-time, or, The robber of the Rhine, page 140
   I don't know what would become of these here young chaps, if it wasn't for such careful old coveys as we are 1851, William Thomas Moncrieff, Selections from the dramatic works of William T. Moncrieff