42 WANDERINGS AND MEMORIES 



from amongst their young, and noticed their dis- 

 tress and the curious method they have of hanging 

 the legs and friUing out the large under-tail coverts, 

 which might give the impression that they held 

 something pressed close to the body.^ Although I 

 and many observers whose opinion is worth accept- 

 ing have not seen such a thing as Woodcock carry- 

 ing its young, nevertheless I do not wish to be 

 dogmatic, and must confess that I have met 

 individuals whose testimony was apparently reli- 

 able who have made out a good case in favour of 

 the fact. No evidence on this question seems 

 acceptable unless the observer has actually seen 

 the parent bird pick up the offspring and bear it 

 off, or when a Woodcock has been shot and the 

 young one has fallen from its grasp. 



On this subject my friend, Mr. Colin Maclean, 

 who is an excellent observer of birds, thus writes — 



" One afternoon about four o'clock, during the 

 first week in June 1909, at Littlewood Park, near 

 Alford, in Aberdeenshire, whilst walking through 

 some rough grass and young bracken towards a 

 large, open pheasant pen, which was enclosed with 

 wire-netting eight feet high, I flushed a Woodcock, 

 which flew off very heavily towards the pheasant 

 pen. Apparently she could not rise high enough 

 to clear the wire, and just before reaching it she 

 dropped a young bird, subsequently rising above 

 the wire and pitching in the pen. I ran up and 

 secured the young Woodcock, which was almost 

 as large as a Thrush. 



^ I have given an illustration of the appearance of the Wood- 

 cock under these circumstances in a book by Tom Speedy. 



