220 LEWIS'S AMERICAN SPORTSMAN. 



very seldom takes wing, even when hotly pressed by a dog ; and all 

 our sportsmen know how difficult it is to spring the rail, even with 

 the assistance of a boat, and a long pole with which to beat the reeds. 



Notwithstanding the different notions respecting the movements 

 of our soras, it is certain that these birds, like many other species, 

 perform regular migrations from North to South, and return in the 

 same way during the following spring; and it is also probable 

 that their flights take place in the night, owing to their instinctive 

 desire to court concealment. Wilson tells us that it was formerly 

 no very unusual thing to find young rails on the meadows of the 

 Delaware and Schuylkill. Mr. Bartram, a gentleman well ac- 

 quainted with this bird, states that he has often seen and caught 

 young rails on his own meadows in the month of June ; that he has 

 also seen their nests, usually in a tussock of grass, containing four 

 or five spotted, dirty, whitish-colored eggs, and that the young ran 

 as soon as they escaped from the shell, being quite black, and 

 glided about through the grass like mice, and during this particular 

 period they resembled the " corn-crake of England." This circum- 

 stance alone proves that the origin of soras is not involved in so 

 much obscurity as many persons are anxious to make it appear, 

 and satisfies us that these birds follow the general laws of nature 

 during the migratory season, and that some few of them, like other 

 birds of similar habits, remain with us in these latitudes during the 

 summer, for the purposes of breeding. 



Although our sportsmen are unwilling to acknowledge the power 

 of soras to fly any considerable distance, we have several instances 

 on record that go to show that this bird is capable of great endu- 

 rance and of very extended flight, and that in common with other 

 birds it is possessed of foresight and strength sufficient to enable it 

 to go in quest of distant climes, congenial to its feelings and modes 

 of life. Mr. Skipwith, our consul several years since in Europe, 

 when returning home, off the capes of Chesapeake, caught several 

 rails that alighted on the ship, and, being well acquainted with the 

 bird, declares that they were the same as "those usually killed on 

 the James River ; and Wilson has also been assured by many gentle- 



