SPOTTED CEAKE. 395 



it pitclies again before a safe shot can be had, and then 

 most probably it drops amongst the reeds and is seen no 

 more. On the 4tli of September, 1861, four were shot 

 at Stalbam on the same day, but I find from my notes 

 for the last twenty years, that the large majority of the 

 specimens brought to our bird-stuffers for preservation 

 have been kiQed between the 2nd and 29th of October. 

 On the 22nd of October, 1856, one old bird and three 

 young of the year were shot at Rockland. About that 

 time, I believe, the greater number take their departure 

 for the south, but stragglers are occasionally met with 

 throughout November, of which I have records in 

 different seasons, on the 2nd, 9th, 16th, and 30th. I 

 have also been assured by the marshmen that this 

 crake may be found at times in mid-winter, but one 

 shown me in the flesh, on the 2nd of December, 1868, 

 is the latest I have ever known. As the birds observed 

 thus late in the year are almost invariably in immature 

 plumage, they are most probably the result of a late 

 hatch, and therefore unable to join the earlier migrants. 



In the " Zoologist " for 1847 (p. 1693), Mr. Alfred 

 Newton records the fact of a bird of tliis species having 

 been picked up dead at Thetford, by the side of the 

 Norfolk Railway, killed by flying against the telegraph 

 wires. *' One wing was broken, and the head bared of 

 a considerable quantity of feathers." This occurred, as 

 he has since informed me, on the 26th of October, 

 1846, and is no doubt the same mentioned in Morris's 

 "British Birds" (vol. v., p. 12), although the date is 

 wrongly quoted and the authority omitted. 



There is little if any distinction in the plumage of the 

 sexes, but the young before their departure in autumn, 

 as described by Selby, have " the upper parts of a deeper 

 oU green, and the white more dispersed in the form of 

 small spots." Besides other minor difierences, also, the 

 bill wants the red colour at the base which marks the 

 adult bird. 

 3 E 2 



