74 SPOTTED CEAKE. 



ground. It moves with ease on the leaves of water-plants, 

 that float on the surface, and if need be swims with equal 

 readiness. It flies in an unsteady straggling manner, with 

 the legs drooped down, and quite low, but at the season of 

 migration has been observed in the evening to rise high in 

 the air. 



The 'ways and means' are worms, slugs, aquatic insects, 

 and the seeds of plants. 



The nest is put together of the larger and smaller stalks 

 of rushes, reeds, and other water-plants, in marshy places, 

 among beds of reeds, and often at the water's edge, and so 

 arranged as to be capable of floating on the water, being 

 thickly lined with soft grass, and the edges well rounded. 

 Nevertheless, they are at times destroyed by the rising of 

 floods. 



The eggs are as many as from seven, eight, nine, or ten, 

 to twelve in number, and even eighteen have been found 

 together, but these doubtless the produce of two birds. They 

 are of a pale reddish white, or yellowish grey ground colour, 

 spotted and speckled with dark reddish brown. The hen sits 

 for three weeks to hatch the eggs. The young quit the 

 nest very soon after being hatched. 



Male; weight, about four ounces; length, about nine inches; 

 bill, yellowish olive, the tip brown, the base dull orange, or 

 reddish brown; iris, dark reddish brown, over it is a streak 

 of purple grey, minutely spotted with white. Forehead, 

 purple grey; head on the sides, greyish green, spotted with 

 black; on the crown, dark brownish black, the feathers edged 

 with yellowish brown, and speckled with white; the neck on 

 the back, and the nape, olivaceous brown, the centre of each 

 feather with a dusky spot, the latter also with white edges; 

 the neck on the sides is greyish olive green, each feather 

 barred and spotted on the tip with white, with a narrow 

 border of black. Chin, dark grey, spotted with white; throat, 

 purple grey, minutely spotted with white; breast above, dull 

 greenish grey, spotted with white, on the sides barred with 

 black, white, and olivaceous brown; below grey, or pale buff 

 white, on the sides leaden grey, barred with white; back 

 above, dark olive brown, each feather with a black centre, 

 and longitudinally streaked with white; below, dark olive 

 green, the feathers marked with white lines surrounded by 

 a narrow border of black. 



The wings have the axillary feathers dark brown, barred 



