606 THE VIRGINIA RAIL. 
No. 240. 
VIRGINIA RAIL. 
i O, U. No, 212. Rallus virginianus Linn. 
Description.—Adu/t: Above brownish black, the feathers broadly striped 
laterally with lighter browns (wood-brown, bistre, and olive-brown), and shad- 
ing into burnt umber on wing-coverts and edges of quills; forehead with numer- 
ous, enlarged, glossy, black shafts without attendant vanes; a light line over eye 
in front, and a dusky line thru eye; lower eyelid white; sides of head ashy gray; 
chin and upper throat white; lower throat and breast cinnamon-rufous ( Mars 
brown), growing paler medially and posteriorly ; belly, flanks, and lining of wings 
brownish dusky or blackish, crossed by narrow white bars, lighter, or sometimes 
almost unmarked fulvous, centrally and on thighs; bill red, darker above. 
Immature birds show blackish more extensively on underparts. Downy young: 
Uniform glossy black. Length 8.00-10.50 (203.2-266.7); wing 4.15 (105.4); 
tail 2.00 (50.8); bill 1.50 (38.1); tarsus 1.33 (33.8); middle toe and claw 1.78 
(45.2). 
Recognition Marks.—Robin size (to appearance) ; marsh-prowling habits. 
The long reddish bill and rufous coloration serve to distinguish this bird from 
the following species. 
Nesting.— Nest: of sedge and grasses in tussock of swamp. Eggs: 6-12, 
pale buffy or creamy white (of noticeably lighter coloration than those of the 
succeeding species); spotted and dotted with reddish brown and obscure lilac. 
Avy. size, 1.25.95 (31.8x 24.1). Season: May to-June 1; one brood. 
General Range.—North America from the British Provinces south to Guate- 
mala and Cuba. 
Range in Washington.—Regular but not common summer resident in 
swamps thruout the State. 
Authorities.—Newberry, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv. VI., Pt. IV., 1857, p. 96. 
C&S. Rh. D'. D2. B. E. 
Specimens.—U. of W. Prov. B. E. 
GIVEN an oasis of water of, say, two acres extent, ina pasture desert of 
barren green; crowd a company of willows into one end; add a half acre of 
bogs crowned with rose bushes; then a little space of clear water; then a jungle 
of cat-tails at the other end; surround the whole with a thirty-foot border of 
sedges and coarse grasses cropped close on the desert side, and you have an 
ideal home for the Virginia Rail and his kind. Poke about carefully in the 
edge of the rose-bog and you will soon start him, a sly reddish brown bird with 
a red eye and a longish beak. See him some ten feet away standing at the 
edge of cover, all alert, one foot uplifted and with claws curled down; or 
when he plants it gingerly, he alternately perks and lowers his head, as tho 
divided in his mind between darting away and_facing it out with you. Simul- 
