364 ORALLY. RALLID^E. 



MANGROVE-HEN.* 



Rallus longirostris. LATH. 



PL enl. 849. 



THE reader shall be introduced to the bird before 

 us, by the delightful pen of my friend, Mr. Hill. 



" 14th of March, 1842. I have visited Passage 

 Fort at a season when Wild-ducks are stretching 

 from one side of the Bay to the other in strings, 

 and Plovers and Sandpipers are feeding in little 

 flocks on the beach. The nights and the mornings 

 are quiet, but the day is one uninterrupted bluster 

 of the sea-breeze. The country is dry. Many of 

 the large trees are leafless, and there is no ver- 

 dure in the grass. Such a picture would seem to 

 afford no great diversity for amusement: the sea, 

 however, is always an interesting object. Whether 

 calm or stirring it has a variety of features, all dif- 

 ferent at different hours of the day. The repose 

 of morning ; the slumbering ocean ; the sleepy 

 mountains kerchiefed in clouds ; the awakened day- 

 light peeping through the curtains of night ; the 

 birds just risen and moving ; the little flocks wend- 

 ing about as if the day had its business to attend 

 to ; the Herons and Egrets shaking their wings 

 by the mirrory waters, and making their toilet 



* Length 15 \ inches, expanse 20^, flexure 5, tail 2^-fc, rictus 2-^, 

 tarsus 2^, middle toe 2^. Irides hazel. 



