THE FAMILY OF WADERS. 275 



one from necessity, will close. I possessed a couple 

 of water-rails recently. Any one who has examined 

 the structure of a water-rail would cease to wonder 

 at the marvellous travelling powers of the bird. 

 It is formed expressly for the purpose of gliding 

 through tangled swamp vegetation. The bird is 

 very courageous ; in fact, the thin, drawn-out creature 

 is decidedly of a pugnacious disposition when he 

 thinks fit. I have seen him on the war-path once, 

 and once only. Then he certainly feared nothing. 

 This was in the breeding season. I have heard 

 him groan, grunt, and squeak in a fashion pecu- 

 liarly his own, when I have been in the thick reed- 

 beds ; have heard also the heavy slush - up of a 

 pike, and for a moment the flick and flutter of 

 wings. What that boded one could only guess at, 

 for it was impossible to see. One thing I know, 

 and that is, when the feathered inhabitants of the 

 swamps have their young, large pike work them- 

 selves right up in the thick of the reed-roots and 

 stems, and there they remain, from motives of their 

 own. 



From the nature of the localities these birds, the 

 waders, frequent, it is very difficult to know much 



