176 GRALLATORES. CREX. CRAKE. 
they hang their legs when only on wing for a short distance. 
All the British species are migratory, and come under the 
designation of summer visitants. The plumage of both sexes 
is nearly alike, differing only in the colours of the male bird 
being purer and brighter in tint. The young, however, are 
very different, and do not acquire the matured plumage till 
they undergo tlie second general moulting 
MEADOW OR CORN CRAKE. 
CreEx PRATENSIS, Bechst. 
PAT By eXOXeXe *, 
Crex pratensis, Bechst. Naturg. Deut. 4. 470. 
Ortygometra Crex, Steph. Shaw’s Zool. 12. 218. pl. 26.—Flem. Br. Anim. 
1: 98. sp. 129. 
Rallus Crex, Linn. Syst. 1. 261. 1.--Gmel Syst. 1. 711. 
Gallinula Crex, Lath. Ind. Orn. 2. 766. sp. 1.—Temm. Man. d’Ornith. 2 
686. 
Porphyrio rufescens, Briss. 5. 533. 5.— Will, 236. 
Rale de Genet, ou Roi des Cailles, Buff: Ois. 8. 146. t. 12.—Id. Pl. Enl. 
750. 
Poule d’Eau de Genet, Temm. Man. d’Ornith. 2. 686. 
Wiesenknarrer, Bechst. 4. 470.—Meyer, Tasschenb. Deut. 1. t. Heft 10. 
Land-Hen, Daker-Hen, or Rail, Will. (Angl.) 170. t. 29. 
Crake Gallinule, Penn. Br. Zool. 2. 484. No. 216. pl.75.— Lath. Syn. 5. 250. 
1.—Mont. Ornith. Dict. 1. Bewick’s Br. Birds. 1. 311. 
Corn-crake, Steph. Shaw’s Zool. 12. 218. pl. 26.—Flem. Br. Anim. 1. 98. 
sp. 129. 
ProvincraL.—Land-rail, Crek, Bean-crake, Corn-cracker, Corn-drake. 
Some writers have attempted to separate the Meadow-Crake 
from the other species, and to make it the type of a genus ; 
not, it would appear, from any essential difference in its 
characters (which, on the contrary, and particularly with 
respect to anatomical structure, agree with the others), but 
from a fancied difference in its habits, which are considered 
not so much approaching to aquatic as those of any of its 
congeners. This modification will, however, be found much 
slighter in reality than they who would thus separate the 
species are willing to allow, being in fact confined to a trif- 
ling difference in the quality and dampness of the soils these 
