144 RALLID.E. 



fresh eggs ; and be has seen the young in their black down 

 taken on Rockland Broad in the last week in July. By 

 the latter part of October, the majority have taken their 

 departure for the South, but stragglers are occasionally met 

 with throughout November and even into December : the 

 marshmen assuring Mr. Stevenson that examples are some- 

 times found in midwinter. The birds observed thus late in 

 the year being almost invariably in immature j^lumage, they 

 are probably late broods which have been unable to join the 

 earlier migrants.* Similar instances are on record from 

 other places ; one of the latest being, perhaps, the specimen 

 recorded by Mr. Blyth as seen by himself in the London 

 market in the month of January, 1834. 



In England the Spotted Crake is more frequently 

 observed in the maritime counties of the south and east 

 coasts, especially in the latter, which still contain fens and 

 " broads " suitable to its requirements. Before the drainage 

 of the fens it was not uncommon in Cambridge and 

 Huntingdonshire, but at the present day its numbers are 

 greatly diminished, even in Norfolk, owing to the reclama- 

 tion of the marshes. Although local, it is said by Mr. 

 Cordeaux to be not uncommon in some parts of the Hum- 

 ber district, and also of the Trent; and it is not rare in 

 Yorkshire, especially in winter : a few nesting regularly 

 on the sedgy banks of the Hull near Beverley, and, at 

 times, near York and Doncaster.f Notwithstanding the 

 drainage of Prestwick Car, Mr. Hancock records it as still 

 breeding occasionally in Durham and Northumberland. 

 On the western side it appears to be very local, but several 

 pairs breed in the bogs of Brecon shire (E. C. Phillips, 

 Zool. 1882, p. 219); and from Wales it ranges up to 

 Cumberland. On the eastern side of Scotland it has been 

 frequently obtained as far north as Elgin, whore the nest 

 has been taken, as well as in Aberdeen and Perthshire, so 

 that it doubtless breeds sporadically in the more southern 

 counties ; but on the west it has not as yet been recorded 



* Birds of Norfolk, ii. p. 393. 



t Clarke, Handbk. Yorkshire Vertebrates, p. 65. 



