52 



wind it cannot fly, and even with the wind its progress is 

 slow and seldom sustained for more than one hundred yards. 

 With a fresh breeze blowing I have seen a rail roll over 

 and over when it attempted to alight on the hard sand. 

 The moment it leaves the ground the dog is after it, and 

 though it should fly one hundred yards he is little behind 

 when it strikes the ground, and then, unless the cover is 

 unusually dense, you have another specimen to add to your 

 collection. 



Although I have taken incubated eggs by May 2, the 

 greater number of rails do not begin to lay until about this 

 date, and some postpone this duty until the latter half of 

 the month. The nests are scattered everywhere over the 

 marshes, the bases of some resting m water, and of others 

 on dry ground. In the rushes a spot is selected under a 

 thick mass of semi-prostrate stems ; in the coarse marsh 

 grass as thick a clump as possible is chosen, and the tips 

 of the grass seem to be bent over as a canopy to the nest. 

 This bending over of the tops of the grass is sometimes 

 sufficiently evident to draw one's attention to the spot. 

 The nest is a slightly hollowed heap of small pieces of 

 dead rush or grass stems. 



From nine to twelve eggs constitute the usual setting, 

 these numbers representing the extremes of incubated sets 

 which I have fomid. They are similar in size, color and 

 markings to those of R. crejntans and scottii, though none 

 show as much yellow in the gro mid-color as a set of crepitans 

 in my collection that was taken in New Jersey. The mark- 

 ings, although scattered irregularly over the shell, are most 

 abundant at the larger end ; but on one egg, out of a series 

 of 120, they are chiefly in the form of a ring at the apex. 

 An average of the measurements of eight eggs selected from 

 four sets of which the parent was taken is 1.68 inches long 

 by 1.17 broad, with extremes of 1.75 by 1.15 and 1.59 by 1.19. 



Not until the set is complete is one likely to find a Wayne's 



