810 SCOLOPAX RUSTICULA. 



says that it is common in Morocco in winter. In Egypt, according to Captain Shelley, it is only a straggler ; 

 he mentions the occurrence of one individual in the Delta of the Nile. It is, however, evidently more 

 numerous at some seasons than others ; for Von Heuglin met with it in March in overgrown gardens near 

 Alexandria and Rosetta, and also in the neighbourhood of Cairo, where it frequents vegetable-fields which 

 are intersected with dykes and watercourses. In North-eastern Africa he never observed it. According to 

 Nauniami it has been met with in Senegambia and on the Gold Coast.. In Madeira and the Canaries it is, 

 according to Mr. Godman, a resident, breeding in all the islands sparingly, and inhabiting high wooded 

 ravines. This gentleman likewise records it as stationary in the Azores, being not uncommon throughout 

 the group, and most abundant in St. George's, Pico, and Flores, where it breeds in March. 



It is interesting to know that it has strayed on two occasions across the Atlantic. On the 9th January, 

 1862, one was killed in Newfoundland ; and Mr. G. N. Lawrence speaks of another specimen which was 

 bought in a market as far back as 1859, and was believed to have been killed near Shrewsbury, New Jersey. 

 It has, notwithstanding, never been recorded from either Greenland or Iceland. 



Habits. — In India the wooded ranges of the south of the peninsula and the slopes of the Himalayas 

 abound with spots which the Woodcock delights in — damp nullahs drained by numerous streams, which now 

 and then in their course create little marshy spots, overgrown with rank vegetation and thorny shrubs, or on 

 the sides of which moist soil furnishes good " boring "-ground ; here and on the outskirts of woods, particularly 

 where the soil is spongy and holds plenty of cover, they are to be found. But though they delight in such 

 secluded ravines and feed on the borders of sylvan streams, they may be found in the daytime, when they 

 are not feeding, in woods on the sides of hills, and in plantations far removed from water. In northern 

 countries they are partial to sheltered larch- and spruce-woods and to thick " oak cover," such as may be 

 seen clothing the sides of narrow valleys in Cornwall, than which there is no better situation for the Wood- 

 cock to be found in England. They like woods where the soil is soft and free, and in which, though they 

 are not on the alert for food, they can, during their time of repose, now and then indulge in a "bore." 



At sunset they sally forth from their hiding-places, no doubt wandering over a large area of country 

 during the night in search of suitable spots to feed in ; and when localities are found containing an abun- 

 dance of food they naturally remain in them after dawn and continue to feed during the morning. The eye 

 of the Woodcock is eminently suited for its nocturnal habits ; it is enormous, the orbital cavities occupying two 

 thirds of the whole skull and leaving but a small cranial space, so that in the dead bird what appears to be all 

 head is, for the most part, eye. The Woodcock is an unsociable bird ; it lives apart from its kind, is almost 

 always flushed singly; and when a number are found in one wood together, the cause of their union lies in 

 local abundance of food, and not in any social propensities, as will appear from their being found in only 

 scattered company. Their chief food consists of worms, of which they are said to eat enormous quantities ; and 

 the assertion of Montagu that it would be constant labour for one person to procure food for two or three 

 Woodcocks is corroborated by Mr. Hancock, who writes, in his ' Catalogue of the Birds of Northumberland,' 

 of a gentleman who reared three, the supplying of which with worms constantly occupied one man. 

 1 have myself found small coleopterous insects in the stomach of this bird, mixed with vegetable matter, 

 which appears to form itself into hard globular masses previous to ejection, having somewhat the appear- 

 ance of Owl-castings. 



The Woodcock is in general a silent species ; but during the breeding-season it makes, while on the wing, 

 a singular note, which Mr. Hancock likens to a " shrill chirp, produced twice, or rather a sort of squeak, 

 like that made with a corkscrew when entering the cork — a noise to set the teeth on edge." Another noise, 

 which is likewise made on the wing, this naturalist calls a kind of croaking, of no long duration, but repeated 

 at intervals. He writes as follows concerning these interesting sounds : — " On one occasion, in Norway, we 

 heard them most distinctly, the Woodcocks all the time flying to and fro in the twilight, about 10 o'clock, p.m., 

 over the tops of the trees of the wood where they were nesting. On another occasion we heard them with 

 equal distinctness near Dunrobin, Sutherlandshire ; tins was the 19th of May, 1849, and likewise in the 

 cuiiing, the birds all the while flying backwards and forwards over the tops of the trees, not far from the 

 spot where we found a nest. Unfortunately on neither occasion had we a sufficiently clear view of the 

 birds to see if the croaking sound was accompanied by any quivering motion of the wings. Therefore I can 



