MOOR-HENS IN HYDE PARK 195 



form, pretty plumage, and amusing manners; nor 

 must it be omitted as a point in its favour that 

 it is not afraid to make itself very much at home 

 with us in London.* This is the little moor-hen, 

 a bird possessing some strange customs, for which 

 those who are curious about such matters may 

 consult its numerous biographies. Every spring 

 a few individuals of this species make their ap- 

 pearance in Hyde Park, and settle there for the 

 season, in full sight of the fashionable world; 

 for their breeding-place happens to be that minute 

 transcript of nature midway between the Dell 

 and Rotten Row, where a small bed of rushes 

 and aquatic grasses flourishes in the stagnant pool 

 forming the end of the Serpentine. Where they 

 pass the winter — in what Mentone or Madeira of 

 the ralline race — is not known. There is a pretty 

 story, which circulated throughout Europe a little 

 over fifty years ago, of a Polish gentleman, cap- 

 turing a stork that built its nest on his roof every 

 summer, and putting an iron collar on its neck 



♦Note that when this was written in 1893, the moor-hen 

 was never known to winter in London; his habits have 

 changed in this respect during the last two decades: he is 

 now a permanent resident. 



