25 

 ON THE MOOR-HEN. {GALLINULA CHLOBOPUS.) 



TO THE EDITOR OF THE NATURALIST. 



Sir, 



Although forty years since I was a steady contributor to the 

 periodicals, for many has the amusing occupation ceased; yet am I now allured 

 by the seductive aspect of your new publication, and especially by the appear- 

 ance of one of your 'Miscellaneous Notices/ to yield once more to the propensity 

 to scrawl. I advert to that on the ^'Incubation and rearing of the young of 

 the Moor- hen." 



Not very distant from my house, and adjoining my lawn, is a pond, which, 

 were it dignified with the name of a little lake, might receive not an inapplicable 

 appellation. Its extent is nearly half an acre, and in its widest part is an island, 

 sheltered on the western side by a dense row of alders, willows, and, rushes; 

 while on it are laurels and rhododendrons, with some trees of twenty years 

 growth; at the western extremity is a small dense covert of alders, osiers, 

 elders, and laurels. It is divided from a small rapid river or mountain stream, 

 by fertile meadows; while within a few miles lies, on the northern side, the 

 elevated and bleak district of Dartmoor — a site more propitious to the colon- 

 ization of waterfowl, more especially from its maritime neighbourhood, and its 

 close proximity to several other small pieces of water — one indeed in an 

 adjoining grove of nearly equal size with itself, can scarcely be described. These 

 ponds are of my own formation; and no sooner were they complete, than a 

 desire to see them peopled by feathered colonists arose; and not unfrequently 

 meeting with Moor-hens while Snipe shooting in my meadows, I assimaed they 

 would be the first occupants. At length I rejoiced in the realization of my 

 wishes. A pair appeared, built their nest on the sedgy brink of the eastern 

 side of the island, and were an object of general interest to the passers by. 

 For three or four years there were regular and undisturbed incubations, but 

 no increase. By turns the female and male, with his glowing crimson bill, 

 watchfully peeping over the nest, were the objects of universal admiration; 

 till an inference arose that the eggs or young were destroyed by rats or 

 snakes, (natrix torquata,) which I have seen there in pursuit of duck's eggs, 

 or that some other vermin frustrated my hopes. At length, in the lower 

 branches of a stunted silver fir, about three feet from the ground, the cautious 

 pair constructed their 'procreant cradle;' and the eastern embankment being 

 sufficiently elevated for their inspection, they were anxiously gazed at by the 

 passers by. That first incubation was productive, and its consequent increase 

 has been enormous, although its limits are difficult to be determined, by reason 

 of the numbers annually driven ofl" by their petulant jealously and unceasing 

 strife. The established colony of some years has consisted of about thirty pairs; 

 and the number of successive broods have been three; and, I fancy, sometimes 

 four — the general produce of each being four and sometimes five, although in 



