WOODCOCK SHOOTING. 87 



dry. As you approach, up spring the same brood, 

 now well feathered and strong, and darting 

 among the trees, pitch severally behind a bush, 

 run a few yards farther and skulk. 



The two old birds are frequently found in 

 company, and here the whole family remain until 

 the increasing drought of summer drives them 



O O 



down to the shores of our large rivers, and the 

 " cripple shooting," as it is not inappropriately 

 called, begins. 



When Frank Forrester, who sometimes belies 

 his nom de plume, tells you that the woodcock 

 regularly rears two broods in a season, he speaks 

 knowingly that which he knows not of. 



We have lived for years in a part of the state 

 of Pennsylvania, where cocks have bred within 

 the memory of man, and we have paid great at- 

 tention to their habits, which are sufficiently 

 curious and interesting, albeit involved in such 

 obscurity that it behooves him who speaks of them 

 to weigh his words. In common with others 

 who have observed them as closely as their reti- 

 ring nature would permit, we are inclined to the 

 opinion that their nests are seldom seen in Penn- 

 sylvania before the fourth of April ; the period of 

 incubation is universally admitted to be twenty- 

 one days, which, allowing a month for the growth 



