Tue WoopDCOCK. 37 
three hours on the misty night of November 6th, 1868. But to 
return nearer home. Woodcock usually alight on our eastern 
shores before dawn, and if they have suffered a more than severe 
buffetting, may be found tamely taking advantage of any hiding- 
place the shore may present, and have even been found squatting 
below an overturned boat. But all being well, they arrive plump 
and in sleek condition, little the worse for their journey, to rest 
but a few hours before again winging their way west. Their 
immigration to our islands takes place more or less regularly in 
October and November, and folklore as regards the date of 
their arrival varies locally. The first full moon in October is 
supposed by some to be the time to keep a good look out. An 
old saying, “ When Daniel gets out of the lion’s den, the ’cock 
will come in here again,’’ refers to the reading in church of the 
lesson from Daniel, ch. vi., which under the old lectionary 
tules of the Church of England was read earlier than it is now, 
and coincided somewhat aptly with the usual appearance of our 
autumn visitors. In years gone by our forefathers kept a very 
much more keen look out than we do now for the first woodcock 
_ that came to our eastern shores. Coverts were not in those days 
artificially stocked with hand-reared pheasants, but could with- 
out jeopardising the “total’’ now demanded by our present 
“covert-shoot ’’? be beaten time and again, so long as there was 
a chance of flushing the long-billed visitor. To illustrate the 
keenness with which these birds were awaited we need only tell 
| the story of a parson preaching one Sunday in an East Yorkshire 
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village some hundred years ago. When in the middle of his 
sermon an excited figure was seen to enter the church, who, 
approaching the pulpit, said—‘ Passon, ’cock is coomed,’’ upon 
which the parson speedily concluded the service, and he and his 
‘congregation lost no time in going down to the beach to 
take toll from among the newly-arrived ’cock. It is 
believed that the numbers of these our visiting migrants 
are greatly decreasing. The continental practice of shooting 
birds when they are “tamed by love’’ is extended to 
these birds also; and our flow of migrants consequently suffers. 
It is, therefore, satisfactory to be able to record that the wood- 
cock as a nesting bird in the British Isles is consistently in- 
_ creasing. This undoubted increase in the number of woodcock 
which nest within our British Isles is difficult to account for. 
