MOOR-HENS IN HYDE PARK 195 



form, pretty plumage, and amusing manners; nor 

 must it be omitted as a point in its favour that 

 it is not afraid to make itself very much at home 

 with us in London.* This is the little moor-hen, 

 a bird possessing some strange customs, for which 

 those who are curious about such matters may 

 consult its numerous biographies. Every spring 

 a few individuals of this species make their ap- 

 pearance in Hyde Park, and settle there for the 

 season, in full sight of the fashionable world; 

 for their breeding-place happens to be that minute 

 transcript of nature midway between the Dell 

 and Rotten Row, where a small bed of rushes 

 and aquatic grasses flourishes in the stagnant pool 

 forming the end of the Serpentine. Where they 

 pass the winter in what Mentone or Madeira of 

 the ralline race is not known. There is a pretty 

 story, which circulated throughout Europe a little 

 over fifty years ago, of a Polish gentleman, cap- 

 turing a stork that built its nest on his roof every 

 summer, and putting an iron collar on its neck 



*Note that when this was written in 1893, the moor-hen 

 was never known to winter in London; his habits have 

 changed in this respect during the last two decades: he is 

 now a permanent resident. 



