184 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 



visible above the crop, is in danger of receiving tlie sportsman's 

 charge. I never attempted to make any great bag, but I 

 have frequently shot ten brace. The biggest bag I heard of 

 was eighty brace to one gun, or rather to one sportsman with 

 two guns, at Cairo. The neighbourhood of Cairo is very 

 good ; indeed it would be hard to particularise any place 

 which is not good at the right time, but on the whole we 

 nowhere got better shooting than in the plain of Thebes, 

 right up to the very Colossi. Without a dog you must 

 expect to lose a third unless your native is very expert in 

 marking them. By the middle of April the migration was 

 all past. On the 12th we killed thirteen brace: that was 

 the last day we made a bag. After that they became just 

 as scarce as they had been in the Delta in January. 



That some stay the summer to breed is certain, and it 

 would appear that a few nest in the winter or early spring, 

 for on the 22nd of March I flushed an early "squeaker " 

 able to fly, which must have been hatched some weeks. I 

 never saw any others. I conclude the natives occasionally 

 catch them for their own consumption, as I was now and 

 then brought a snared one. In Hasselquist's time they 

 netted them in Lower Egypt. 



129. Corncrake, Ortygomctra crex (Linn.) 



The only one I saw was a stufl"ed one at Mr. Mayer's, 

 killed at or near Alexandria. 



130. Spotted Crake, Porzana viaructta, Leach. 



Was met with at Damietta and Benha in January. 

 Captain Shelley may be right in thinking it a resident, but 

 we did not find any at the Faioum. 



