120 KRIDER'S SPORTING ANECDOTES. 



spring and during the summer, they have a pe- 

 culiar, prolonged scream, which they emit in 

 the air, on the ground, or from a fence-rail, on 

 which last they frequently alight, stretching 

 their slender and elegantly formed necks, and 

 opening and spreading their wings. At this 

 season of the year their sharp, rolling whistle is 

 comparatively seldom heard. They run and fly 

 well, but their suspicious manner of lifting their 

 heads readily betrays them on the ground, while 

 their strange cry often leads the shooter to the 

 field which they inhabit. Mr. Jacob Beck, an 

 old sportsman, who had killed many of these 

 birds in the month of September, was totally 

 unacquainted with their common note on the 

 breeding ground, and would not believe them to 

 be the same birds, until he had examined several 

 specimens, shot in the fields of Montgomery, in 

 the neighborhood of Perkiomen Creek. They 

 feed principally upon grass-hoppers and other 

 insects. We once killed a bird early in the 

 summer which had two large gooseberries in its 

 crop. In this part of the country they are called 

 regan-fegles, or rain-birds, from the supposition 

 that their scream is ominous of wet weather. 

 They will not lie to the dogs, and must be killed 

 by stratagem. In August they begin to leave 



