FLORIDA GALLINULE. 401 



Not gifted by nature with the long wings of other Waders, the Water 

 Hens, being anything but wanderers, obey both their conformation and 

 natural disposition by not undertaking long periodical migrations, but 

 are permanently resident in their native countries, merely removing 

 from one station to another within certain provinces, and without roam- 

 ing over the adjacent districts. They run with rapidity ; fly badly ; 

 always in motion, and frequently carry their tail high, as represented in 

 the plate, showing the white plumage of the vent, especially when run- 

 ning on the ground. They dive when frightened, but never after food. 

 They feed on small fishes, insects, and some vegetables, picking them up 

 as they swim. They seldom leave the pond or river where they get 

 their food and exercise, and are peculiarly attached to such as are bor- 

 dered with sedge and bushes ; and standing waters, green with vegeta- 

 tion, furnish them with abundant provision of animalcula and pond- 

 weeds. They lay twice or thrice in a season, building their nest upon 

 low trees, stumps and bogs, with sticks and fibrous substances, rushes 

 and weeds, or other coarse materials in great abundance, invariably 

 placing it by the water side. The eggs are very long, of a greenish 

 white, spotted with rufous, and very pointed at the small end. There 

 are nine or ten in the first brood, the subsequent ones less and less nu- 

 merous, and the mother never leaves the nest without carefully covering 

 them with weeds. The chicks are no sooner hatched than they swim, 

 with instinctive dexterity, pursuing their parent, and imitating all her 

 motions. Thus are two or three broods reared in a season, which while 

 under her care she regularly after their evening's sport leads back to the 

 nest, where she uses every exertion to make them warm, dry, and com- 

 fortable : but when grown up and taught to provide for themselves, she 

 turns them off. 



The Florida Gallinule, or Water Hen, is fourteen inches long : the 

 bill one and a quarter to the corner of the mouth, and one and an 

 eighth to the posterior portion of the clypeus ; it is red, as well as the 

 clypeus, with the point greenish. This clypeus, or bare red membrane 

 spreading over the forehead, is more than half an inch wide between 

 the eyes, occupying a great portion of the head, and being posteriorly 

 cut somewhat square or slightly cordate, the reverse of what is observed 

 in the European, which is rather pointed at this place. The whole 

 plumage from the very base is of a dark plumbeous hue, or sooty black, 

 the head and neck being a shade darker, and the lower portion lighter 

 and more tinged with bluish, so that they might be styled cinereous. 

 The mantle, that is, the whole back with the wing-coverts, are highly 

 tinged with olivaceous : the quills are blackish, and the tail deep black, 

 much more than in the other allied species. The under tail-coverts are 

 also deep black, with the lateral pure white : the white also lines the wings 

 externally from all round the shoulder, almost, but not quite to the tip 



Vol. III.— 26 



