76 THE GAME BIEDS AND WILD FOWL 



Family EALLID^. Genus Crbx. 



Subfamily Ballinje. 



LITTLE CRAKE. 



CEBX PAEVA.— (ScqpoZi). 



Rallus parvus, Scop. Ann. I. Hist. Nat. p. 108 (1769). 



Crex pusilla, Maogill, Brit. B. iv. p. 541 (1852 mo Pallas) ; Lilford, Col. Kg. Brit. B. 

 pts. XX., xxvii. (1891, 1893). 



Porzana parva (Scop.), Dresser, B. Eur. vii. p. 283, pi. 498 (1878); Yarrell, Brit. B. 

 ed. 4 iii. p. 148 (1883). 



Crex parva (Scop.), Seebohm, Hist. Brit. B. ii. p. 457 (1884); Dixon, Nests and Eggs 

 Non-indig. Brit. B. p. 330 (1894); Seebohm, Col, Eig. Eggs Brit. B. p. 85, pi. 22 (1896). 



Zapornia parva (Scop.), Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit, Mus. xxiii. p. 89 (1894); Sharpe, Handb. 

 B. Gt. Brit. iv. p. 223 (1897). 



Geographical distribution — British: The Little Crake is a rare 

 visitor to the British Islands on spring and autumn passage. There is no 

 evidence of its having nested in this country, although odd pairs may remain 

 behind in spring to breed, and stray individuals may occasionally stay through 

 the vs^inter. It has been most frequently observed in Norfolk, and recorded from 

 Suffolk, Cambridge, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Cumberland, Lancashire, Oxfordshire, 

 Middlesex, Sussex, Hants, Dorset, Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall. Scotland 

 claims one ; Banff, March, 1852 : Ireland another ; Balbriggan, March, 1854. 

 Foreign: Western Palsearctic region. It breeds in Europe as far north as 

 Holstein, and along the southern coast of the Baltic to Livonia ; thence across 

 Eussia to Astrakhan and the Caucasus, and eastwards through Persia and 

 Afghanistan to Eussian Turkestan. Many Asiatic examples pass down the Indus 

 Valley to winter in Western Scinde and North-east Africa. Westwards, it 

 appears to be a resident in Algeria, an abnormal migrant to the Canaries, to pass 

 through Denmark, Spain and Greece on migration, and to breed in Italy and 

 Sicily, Savoy, the valley of the Ehone, Central France, Southern Germany, 

 Poland, and Austro-Hungary. It is said to have nested in South Sweden. 



Allied forms. — None more closely related than Baillon's Crake and its 

 allies already described in the previous chapter. 



Habits. — The Little Crake, in many of its habits and in the localities it 

 frequents, somewhat closely resembles the preceding species. It is, however, not 

 quite so shy or skulking, and may be far more frequently observed in the open. 

 It frequents marshes, swamps and reed-beds, and pools of stagnant water ; and, 



