218 FLIGHT OF MOORHENS AT NIGHT. [PART IT. 
woolly fleece, especially about the head and 
shoulders.” 
Others, besides myself, have probably noticed 
how suddenly and mysteriously Moorhens will 
sometimes disappear from a piece of water, espe- 
cially if they have been disturbed by the cutting 
of the wood on its banks or other causes. There 
can be no difficulty in accounting for this, if, as 
I am persuaded, they occasionally take at night 
much more extensive flights than their general 
habits would lead one to suppose probable. Un- 
less there is any other bird, of which I am igno- 
rant, whose cry precisely resembles that of the 
Moorhen, I am positive that I have several times 
heard them on wing at night high overhead, three 
of the occasions being very remarkable, namely, 
while they were passing over Christ Church (Ox- 
ford), Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and Blackfriars Bridge. 
Of course it is possible that I may have been mis- 
taken, but I am so intimately acquainted with the 
cry of the bird that it would be very difficult to 
satisfy me that such was the case. 
That they may have the power of taking such 
extensive flights may, I think, be easily conceded, 
when it is remembered that the Landrail, whose 
power of wing scarcely, if at all, exceeds that of 
