108 General Notes. [fj£ 



The brain of this species is always infested with numerous cranial para- 

 sites (Filaria anhingce), which are coiled up in the cerebellum. An adult 

 male taken May 18, 1910, had ten of these parasites coiled up in the brain, 

 while the gizzard contained great numbers of parasites. That these para- 

 sites infest the brain, as well as the gizzard, of the Water-Turkey, was 

 pointed out by Dr. Jeffries Wyman ' in a lengthy article as long ago as 

 1868. It would be exceedingly interesting to ascertain by what means 

 these parasites are taken into the body and through what channels they 

 make their way into the brain. — Arthur T. Wayne, Mount Pleasant, S. C. 



A Nest of the Florida Gallinule.— In 1890 and 1891 the Florida Galli- 

 nule (Gallinula galeata) nested in the marsh at Branchport, N. Y., in large 

 numbers; then several years of dry weather followed, the water receded, 

 the ground was cultivated and the flags and reeds were replaced by crops 

 of corn and cabbage, and in place of the Gallinules and Rails nesting in the 

 reeds we had Spotted Sandpipers and Kildeers nesting among the corn rows. 



High water came again in the spring of 1901 and the flats have been 

 flooded each spring since until the marsh has gradually come back to her 

 own with cat-tails, rushes, swamp grass and water lilies, and Soras, Vir- 

 ginia Rails and Least Bitterns are becoming more common each year. 



I am quite sure that a Florida Gallinule nested here in 1909 as I saw one 

 several times in June and a juvenile was shot here in September. Several 

 times in May, 1910, when sweeping the marsh with my binoculars I saw a 

 gallinule swimming about in an open space in the flags and in early June 

 I flushed one from the thick flags but after a thorough search could not 

 find the nest. 



June 13, C. F. Stone, E. P. St. John and myself were searching the marsh 

 for nests of rail and bittern and Mr. St. John found the gallinule's nest close 

 by the place where I had flushed the gallinule. It was well hidden in a thick 

 growth of sweet flag (Acorus columns) and bulrushes (Scirpus lacustris) 

 and was composed of dead flags woven around and supported by the last 

 year's growth of flags. It contained ten eggs which appeared to be well 

 along in incubation. The female must have just left the nest as the eggs 

 were warm but we neither saw nor heard her while we were there. I got 

 a good picture showing the nest and eggs at this time. I visited the nest 

 many times after this but could not get a glimpse of the female. 



June 26, there were but five eggs left in the nest, one with the chick ex- 

 posed and struggling to free itself, but there were no other young ones 

 visible. 



Leaving the nest for about half an hour, I visited a nest of the American 

 Bittern and exposed several plates on the five young bitterns. Returning 

 to the gallinule's nest, I approached very carefully and found a downy 

 young one sitting on the reeds where they had been broken down by my 

 many visits. It sat there watching me, its eyes twinkling, starting up ner- 



1 Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist., XII, 1868, 100-104. 



