OB SEE VA TIONS ON BIRDS. 325 



somewhat in the manner of the plumage of the parent bird, 

 and were equal in size at each end. The dam was sitting 

 on the eggs when found, which contained the rudiments of 

 young, and would have been hatched perhaps in a week. 

 From hence we may see the time of their breeding, which 

 corresponds pretty well with that of the swift, as does also 

 the period of their arrival. Each species is usually seen 

 about the beginning of May. Each breeds but once in a 

 summer ; each lays only two eggs. 



July 4th, 1790. The woman who brought me two fern- 

 owl's eggs last year on July 14th, on this day produced me 

 two more, one of which had been laid this morning, as 

 appears plainly, because there was only one in the nest the 

 evening before. They were found, as last July, on the 

 verge of the down above the hermitage, under a beechen 

 shrub, on the naked ground. Last year those eggs were 

 full of young, just ready to be hatched. 



These circumstances point out the exact time when these 

 curious nocturnal migratory birds lay their eggs and hatch 

 their young. Fern-owls, like snipes, stone-curlews, and 

 some other birds, make no nest. Birds that build on the 

 ground do not make much of nests. — White. 



No author that I am acquainted with has given so 

 accurate and pleasing an account of the manners and habits 

 of the goat-sucker as Mr. White, taken entirely from his 

 own observations. Its being a nocturnal bird has prevented 

 my having many opportunities of observing it. I suspect 

 that it passes the day in concealment amidst the dark and 

 shady gloom of deep-wooded dells, or as they are called here 

 gills; having more than once seen it roused from such 

 solitary places by my dogs, when shooting in the daytime. 

 I have also sometimes seen it in an evening, but not long 



