THE BIRDS OF lONA AJSTD MULL. 241 



tlie house to dislodge this murderer of my sleep. A good miuiy may 

 be shot on their first nrrival, when the grass is not so very long. They 

 are very good eating ; indeed, the game-laws include them under the 

 head of game. Perhaps they once were more numerous in England. 

 Here, in Sussex, I never hear their crake, and they seem only to be 

 known as a bird of passage, making a temporary stay on their way to 

 and from their breeding places. In lona many nests are discovered 

 when the grass is cut for hay, containing from twelve to fifteen eggs, 

 and I have often wondered how so small a bird can cover so many, 

 especially as they are large in proportion to the size of the bird. The 

 water rail swims well, but I have also seen the corncrake or land rail 

 take the water and swim when forced to do so. 



I must give you a morsel from my favourite author, of date 1807. 

 " By Dr Darwin we are told that all the water-fowl of Liberia begin 

 their journey to the south as soon as the first frost sets in, the rail 

 alone remaining, which becomes torpid, and sleeps under the snow. 



' His torpid wing the rail, exulting, tries, 

 Mounts the soft gale, and wantons in the skies.' 



The people of the north being asked how rails migrate, because they 

 seem to have no power to take long flights, have replied that, when the 

 cranes go away, they each take a rail upon his back." 



It is remarkable that the water rail, who suffers so much by being- 

 frozen out of his haunts, should not follow the example of his cousin, 

 the land rail, and remove to warmer climes for the winter. 



Thk W.ATnii Hen. 



Is not very abundant, but two pair come regularly to breed upon a 

 little marshy pond among the hills of lona. I suppose the natives are 

 not very familiar with it, for on showing a specimen I had captured to 

 a party of lonians, they could not think what it was, till an old man 

 very seriously observed that it must be a devil in feathers, because, 

 having the legs and feet of a common hen, it swam and dived, and so 

 presumed to run in the face of nature. 



I had great difficulty in getting ■ this first specimen, as the birds 

 invariably disappeared under the water the moment anybody came 

 near, and they remained submerged and invisible as long as you stayed 

 in sight. Their habit is to sink under water all but the end of their 



