THE YELLOW RAIL 237 
pie which is constructed of rails is a most suc- 
culent morsel, a very different creation from a 
pie built from street-scavenging English spar- 
rows, which is not uncommonly the material 
used when the flight of soras has been small. 
THE YELLOW RAIL. 
(Porzana noveboracensis.) 
This pretty little fellow is a visitor along the 
eastern coast and in some of the inland marshes 
of eastern North America. The range of its 
migration is extensive, reaching from Hudson 
bay to the Gulf of Mexico or even further south. 
Nowhere in all this stretch of country is it 
abundant, yet while most naturalists seem to 
think it a rare visitor in New England, espe- 
cially so in the northern parts, there is some 
reason to believe that it is more numerous here 
than is generally supposed. Indeed, from my 
own experience I should say that it is more 
common here than the Virginia rail, for within 
the last three years I have known of the cap- 
ture of possibly fifty specimens of the Yellow 
Rail near Portland, Me., and have myself taken 
