VIRGINIAN RAIL. 43 



to elude the best dog, or if likely to be overtaken, rise on wing, fly with 

 dangling legs eight or ten yards, drop among the weeds, and run ofF as 

 swiftly as before. Notwithstanding all this, I managed to secure a good 

 number of them by means of a partridge net, setting the wings of that 

 apparatus at very obtuse angles, and calling them by imitating the lisp- 

 ing notes of the female from some distance beyond the bag of the net. 

 Now and then I found them too cunning for me, as, on discovering that 

 the wings of the net were in their way, they would get over it in the 

 same manner as that in which a sailor mounts the shrouds of a ship. Our 

 Common Coot uses the same artifice, as I shall elsewhere describe^ 



The nest of the Virginian Rail is not easily found after incubation 

 has commenced, for then the male, contrary to the habits of most birds, 

 becomes comparatively silent, and the female quite mute. At such times 

 I have once or twice almost trodden oh one, which I should never have 

 discovered, had not the poor bird fluttered off in despair, employing all 

 the artifices used by other species on such occasions. It is placed on a 

 small elevation formed by the accumulation of the stalks of a large bunch 

 of grasses, in the centre of which some dry weeds are arranged to the 

 height of two or three inches, with a very shallow cavity. The eggs are 

 four or five, seldom more than six or seven, and resemble in colour those 

 of the Ralhis crepitans, although smaller, measuring an inch and a quarter 

 in length, by eleven-twelfths in breadth, and being rather more rounded. 

 The young are covered with a jet black down, and run after their mother 

 as soon as they make their escape from the egg ; — at least I suppose this 

 to be the case, on account of my having caught some that seemed newly 

 hatched. The mother leads them with the greatest care among the 

 long grass of the damp meadows, or the weeds growing near the ponds, to 

 which they resort at all times, and particularly near the margins of pools 

 or muddy streams, into which they run and disperse on the least appear- 

 ance of danger. V^Hien no water is near, the little ones squat in silence, 

 and await the call of their parent, to which all at once answer, when they 

 quickly collect once more around her. 



This species is able to cling to, and climb along the blades of tall 

 grasses, even under water, when in danger, and is equally able to swim 

 gracefully to a considerable distance, as to alight on low bushes, in which 

 situation I have shot a few of them. When amid the broad leaves of 

 watei'-lilies, they walk and run on them with as much ease as the Galli- 

 nules ; and I would be inclined to assign them an intermediate station 



