70 Miscellaneous. 



vered with copse wood, where there was a Woodcock's nest with 

 young birds, and carefully approaching the place, they heard the old 

 bird, as they supposed, give a peculiar cry or " squeel," and saw it 

 immediately fly up with a young bird in its claws ; and Mr. Muirhead 

 declares he could not have made any mistake, as the bird was not 

 above ten or twelve yards from him, so that he saw it most distinctly ; 

 they then went forward to the nest, and found another fledged young 

 bird still remaining squatted in it, which he was prevented handling, 

 by the keeper informing him that if he did so, it would in all proba- 

 bility be removed, and not brought back again to the nest. He was 

 told that there were generally three or four eggs in the nest. I have 

 the pleasure of also exhibiting an egg of this bird which was taken 

 from a nest near Durris, Kincardineshire ; it is about 1 inch 1 lines 

 in leagth, and 1 inch 4 lines in breadth ; of a yellowish white, blotched 

 and spotted with gray and various shades of yellowish brown ; the spots 

 being more frequent towards the larger end, "We have in these in- 

 stances another detailed account of the curious and extraordinary cir- 

 cumstance of birds attempting to rescue their young from anticipated 

 danger, and in the Woodcock these are by no means to be considered 

 as solitary examples ; some three instances of a similar kind occurring 

 in this country being quoted in Yarrell's ' British Birds ' (vol. ii. 

 p. 591), from that valuable storehouse of facts in zoology, the 'Ma- 

 gazine of Natural History,' Cases of this kind however seem to be 

 so very strange, that we are inclined to give various explanations be- 

 fore we can persuade ourselves of their possibility, and to one of these I 

 may in passing allude : for example, a bird-fancier told me he had seen 

 instances where the presence of an addled or unhatched egg in the 

 nest of some of his breeding birds, had given rise to the appearance 

 at least of the old bird carrying a young one out of its nest. The 

 bird was sitting very closely on her recently hatched young, the 

 addled egg being accidentally broken, its contents spreading over 

 the breast of the mother as well as over one of the young birds ; and 

 on her rapidly leaving the nest to feed, the young one, having 

 become adherent to its mother's breast, was carried out with it ; the 

 heat of the mother while in the nest fielping to dry the albumen, 

 and in this way glue the two together, and in some instances so 

 closely, that he had been obliged to seize the mother for the purpose 

 of removing the young one, while in other instances it dropped off^ 

 shortly after the bird left the nest : and this he had seen to occur 

 both in pigeons and canaries. I am not aware how far a similar 

 cause may be considered as explaining any of the instances described 

 as occurring among birds in their state of native freedom ; although 

 in many cases I should suppose it impossible to be perfectly certain 

 how the young bird was carried by the mother, whether accidentally 

 or by manifest design. And I suspect it will require more extended 

 and carefully minute observation before we shall be quite able to ex- 

 plain them ; still in the several instances noticed by Yarrell, as well 

 as in those to which I have alluded, there seems no reason for doubt- 

 ing the fact of the young bird being actually carried off" in the claws 

 of the anxious parent bird. From these young Woodcocks being 



