RALLIDA. 449 
a stoat upon a Moorhen in the ‘ Zoologist’ for 1864, 
in which the Moorhen, after a very short chase, 
during which it never took to the wing at all, but 
only hid its head in some thick grass, was killed by 
the stoat. 
On one occasion I witnessed a very interesting 
proceeding on the part of a Moorhen in taking care 
of its young and reviving them when exhausted. 
The mother had led her whole brood into a small 
pond, from which they could not get out: after a 
considerable chase I rescued the young ones with a 
landing-net, but they were almost exhausted from 
constantly diving to escape being caught. The first 
I caught I put out on the lawn close to another pond; 
it was so beat it could not run or walk. While I was 
catching the others the mother came up and tried to 
get the young one away, but finding that impossible 
she immediately sat down and hovered it. The next 
two I caught were not so exhausted, so the mother 
unceremoniously kicked them into the pond, where 
the old male soon came to them and led them off. 
The last was exhausted like the first: I put it down 
near where the old bird was hovering the first; she 
was then in great difficulties, as she could not get 
them together to hover both at once, which she tried 
hard to do; but at last she went back to the first, 
which was certainly getting stronger, and hovered 
that till it was sufficiently recovered to be pushed 
into the pond lke the two others; and when I left 
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