Herons, Raits, Etc. 237 
They are migratory, but both occur throughout the 
United States except on the Pacific coast. The 
Florida gallinule is much the more common of the 
two. In the valley of the Delaware they are rather 
shy, especially when nesting, but in August, like the 
king-rails, are apt to be noisy when excited or alarmed. 
Their utterances at this time are a good deal like the 
imitative sounds made by the yellow-breasted chat. 
One reason, perhaps, why these birds are not more 
generally known is that they keep very much in the 
background during the day, and are active in the 
early evening. This trait led me to consider these 
gallinules rare on the upper tide-water meadows of 
the Delaware; but I learned recently that in fact they 
were not uncommon, and one of them nested every 
year in the swamps some distance back from the 
river valley. Dr. Warren considers the purple galli- 
nule as extremely rare in Pennsylvania, and the latter, 
the Florida gallinule,as uncommon. This may be 
true of the interior of the State, but not of the Dela- 
ware Valley and of Southern New Jersey. The 
Florida gallinule nested on the shore of the mill- 
pond in Bristol, Pennsylvania, in the early summer 
of 1893, and is a familiar bird to all the gunners of 
that neighborhood. 
The common Coot is so seldom seen, except swim- 
ming on our ponds and inland creeks, and, of course, 
the rivers, that to most people it is much more like a 
duck than a rail-bird, and is known very widely as 
the “ Crow-duck,” about as absurd a name as could 
well be imagined. 
The coot is migratory in the Middle and New 
