NEST AND EGGS OF THE YELLOW RAIL 



Plate IV. Eggs of the Yellow Rail 



(Porzana noveboracensis) 

 THE NESTING OF THE YELLOW RAIL 



By P. B. Peabody 



THIS fugitive water bird is well known to science during the two yearly 

 migratons ; but, — who ever finds its nest ? The writer of this sketch 

 has diligently tried to unearth just a little information concerning the nest- 

 ing habits of the Yellow Rail during the past two years. Yet he has been 

 utterly unable to secure a syllable of information, save that connected with 

 the incomplete set of five eggs now in the Smithsonian Institution. 



What is here written, then, covers, wholly, the writer's own observa- 

 tions. But the barest justice compels him to say, that the North Dakota 

 breeding ground, wherein all the following notes were gathered, was dis- 

 covered by that sturdy young naturalist, Frederick Maltby. Back in the 

 '9o's the writer heard the click of the Yellow Rail on the willow-margined 

 marshlands of Kittson County, Minnesota. Save in the North Dakota cou- 



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