104 NOTES ON THE 



gloaming of the evening. They are found to have arrived 

 about the first of May with great uniformity, and after about 

 three weeks the nests are built, and consist of a pile of weeds 

 and grass of considerable bulk, having only about an inch in 

 exavation, sometimes a little deeper, into which they deposit 

 eight to ten eggs. I should say that when the first egg is layed 

 the depression is very slight indeed, but the male continues to 

 build up the structure around the female, or she rearranges 

 the material so as to increase the elevation around herself, or, 

 which is the more probable, the weight of her narrow body 

 upon the loose, light materials, continues to deepen the excava- 

 tion for sometime after she begins to occupy it. The color of 

 the eggs is a dark, dirty buff, blotched with different shades 

 of brown, or a reddish and brown. Their habits confine them 

 to swamps, marshes and meadows difficult to approach, and 

 are therefore less frequently discovered. From these consider- 

 ations we are justified in the presumption that they may be 

 much more numerous than at first appears. Except in unusu- 

 ally favorable seasons they leave in their autumnal migrations 

 early in September, but they are occasionally seen as late as 

 the 25th of that month. During the summer I find them about 

 the reedy bays of most of the lakes in different seasons and not 

 infrequently along the marshy borders of several streams 

 within an hour's ride of my home. Examples of this species 

 are often to be seen mounted, in the shops of the taxidermists, 

 representing both sexes and the young of the year. 



Although Mr. Washburn made his explorations of the Red 

 river valley between the 28th of July and the 12th of Sep- 

 tember, for some reason or other he failed to find these Rails, 

 although he met with Soras in abundance everywhere. Mr. 

 Holzinger reports them as frequently seen about Lake Winona. 

 I am not a little surprised that so careful an observer as Dr. 

 Hvoslef did not mention their presence at Lanesboro. 



SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. 



Much smaller than either the King or the Clapper Rail, but 

 resembles them both in form and the former in color. Upper 

 parts olive-brown with longitudinal stripes of brownish-black; 

 line from the base of the bill over the eye reddish- white; throat 

 white; neck before, and breast bright rufous; abdomen and 

 under tail coverts, with transverse bands of black and white, 

 the black being the wider; upper wing coverts bright rufous- 

 chestnut; under wing coverts black, with trransrerse lines of 

 white. 



Length, 7.50; wing. 4; tail, 1.50. 



Habitat, North America. 



