438 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
independent observation by another equally good naturalist may 
be quoted for the purpose of showing that the young are carried 
in another and a different manner to that already described, and 
that they are thus transported, not only to escape their enemies, 
but for the purpose of obtaining food, which, in their unfledged 
state, they would be unable to procure at any distance from the: 
nest. Charles St. John, in his ‘Natural History and Sport in 
Moray’ (p. 210), says :— 
“JT have again seen the old Woodcocks carrying their young down to 
the soft, marshy places to feed. Unfitted as their feet appear to be for 
grasping anything, the old birds must have no slight labour in carrying 
their whole family (generally consisting of four) every evening to the 
marshes, aud back again in the morning. They always return before 
sunrise. Occasionally I have come upon a brood of young Woodcocks in a 
dark, quiet, swampy part of the woods, near which they have probably been 
bred. Ina case of the kind we may suppose that the old birds are saved 
the trouble of conveying their young to a distant feeding-place; but as the 
young birds are frequently hatched in long heather in dry situations, and 
far from any marshes, they would inevitably perish in the nest were they 
not daily carried backwards and forwards by their parents. The quantity 
of worms required to sustain one of these birds would astonish those town- 
bred naturalists who gravely assert that the Woodcock ‘lives on suction.’ 
* ok %* + As soon as the young are hatched, the old birds are obliged 
to carry them to the feeding-ground, which is often at some distance. The 
young, though able to run immediately, are tender helpless little things, 
and could by no means scramble through the tangled heather and herbage 
which often surround their nest, perhaps for many hundred yards. It long 
puzzled me how this portage was effected. That the old birds carried their 
young I had long since ascertained, having often seen them in the months 
of April and May in the act of doing so, as they flew towards nightfall 
from the woods down to the swamps in the low grounds. From close 
observation, however, I found out that the old Woodcock carries her young, 
even when larger than a Snipe, not in her claws, which seem quite incapable 
of holding up any weight, but by clasping the little bird tightly between her 
thighs, and so holding it tight towards her own body. In the summer and 
spring evenings the Woodcocks may be seen so employed passing to and 
fro, and uttering a gentle cry, on their way from the woods to the marshes. 
They not only carry their young to feed, but also, if the brood is suddenly 
come upon in the daytime, the old bird lifts up one of her young, flies off 
with it fifty or sixty yards, drops it quietly, and flies silently on. The little 
bird immediately runs a few yards, and then squats flat on the ground 
amongst the dead leaves, or whatever the ground is covered with. ‘The 
