248 GRUIFORMES CHAP. 
during both day and night. Companies are described by Mr. 
Hudson as meeting to dance about with expanded wings and open 
beaks. Somewhat similar in colour to certain members of the last 
genus is Megacrex inepta of South New Guinea, one of the largest 
Rails known, which is usually seen running swiftly along water- 
courses ; while the black Habroptila waliacit of Halmahera loves 
forests. The curious Himantornis haematopus of West Africa is 
brown, with black and rufous mottlings above, whitish throat, 
stout green and black bill, and red feet. Dryolimnas cuvieri 
of Madagascar, Mauritius, and Aldabra Island, and Canirallus 
kioloides of the first-named and West Africa must be briefly 
mentioned, as must fallina reaching from India to North-East 
Australia, which has half a dozen small brown species, with 
chestnut on the head and chest, and black and white barring below. 
Crea pratensis, the widely-ranging Corn-Crake or Land-Rail, 
extends from most of Europe to the north of Central Asia, winter- 
ing in Africa, and occurring accidentally in North America, or 
even Greenland and Australia. Zapornia parva, the Little Crake, 
Porzana maruetta, the Spotted Crake, and P. bailloni, Baillon’s 
Crake, are some- 
what similar 
British Birds, the 
two latter of which 
have bred in our 
islands, P. maru- 
ettw still doing so 
in some districts. 
This. ‘species is 
brownish-olive with 
white flecks above 
and below, grey 
belly, and flanks 
showing black and white bars. Of its dozen congeners, covering 
nearly the whole globe, P. carolina, the Sora Rail of North America, 
is particularly well-known. In the Ethiopian genus Corethrura, ex- 
tending to Madagascar, the males are blackish, spotted or streaked 
with white, and have fine chestnut heads, necks, or even breasts, the 
female being dusky with rufous mottlings: in Rallicula of New 
Guinea the chestnut extends over most of the body. Porzanula 
Fic. 50.—Land-Rail. Crex pratensis. x, 
1 Argentine Ornithology, ii. London, 1889, p. 153. 
