50 LAND-RAIL. 



LAND-RAIL. 



CORN-CRAKE. DAKER HEN. MEADOW-CRAKE. 

 PLATE CLXXIX. FIGURE I. 



Crex pratensis, SELBY. JENYNS. 



Rallus crex, MONTAGU. 



Gallinula crex, BEWICK. 



Ortygometra crex, FLEMING. 



Porphyrio rufescens, BRISSON. 



THE nest of this species is placed among long 

 grass or corn, in a furrow or some slight hollow, 

 and is lined with a few of the leaves and stalks of 

 the neighbouring herbage. 



The eggs, commonly seven or eight, or ten, or 

 even eleven in number, are of a pale reddish-brown, 

 reddish, or yellowish-white colour, spotted and speckled 

 with grey and reddish brown. They do not vary much, 

 except in the size and greater or less number of the 

 spots. Some are of a red-tinted ground colour, with 

 blots of deep red brown and purple; others white, with 

 a faint tinge of blue, and fancifully streaked and 

 spotted all over. Two broods are wont to be reared 

 in the year, the first being hatched between the be- 

 ginning or middle of June, or later, towards the end. 

 I have known however of a nest of ten eggs at Nun- 

 burnholme not hatched on the igth. of July, (1876), 

 and another of seven on the 22nd.: a young bird had 



