370 



ORALLY. RALLID^E. 



man until he nearly comes up to it. Its flight 

 is singularly ineffective ; slow, heavy, and laboured ; 

 the head is projected, and the body hangs down, 

 as I have seen the body of some unwieldy Bombyx, 

 distended with eggs : the feet also are pendent. 



I have never found in the gizzard of the Red- 

 Rail, (which though small, is muscular) anything 

 but a homogeneous cream or mud of a dark brown 

 hue ; or a green mucus. 



The flesh is pale and flabby; the fat of a rich 

 salmon-red. 



A specimen sent to Mr. Hill by Dr. Hay from 

 the neighbourhood of the Black River, in St. Eliza- 

 beth's, illustrated, in the manner of its capture, the 

 habits of the genus. The Doctor observed, while 

 standing on the steps of the house at Elim Estate, 

 this Rail sauntering through the grass. He pur- 

 sued it, and ran it among some oleanders that grew 

 in clumps about, and succeeded in getting it. When 

 brought into the house, the bird shot rapidly across 

 the floor, and getting into a darkened corner of 

 the room, remained quiet there, believing itself 

 concealed. On being driven out from that hiding- 

 place, it again scudded away over the floor to 

 another dark corner, in which it remained quiet 

 as before. These recesses seemed to represent the 

 dense coverts in which it ordinarily conceals itself 

 in apprehended danger ; its reliance on which, doubt- 

 less, made it so easy a prey to its captor's hand, 

 when it had taken refuge among the stems of the 

 oleanders. 



