AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 321 



and uncut, was rotting on the ground, four of these 

 birds Avere shot and several more seen. My personal 

 acquaintance with this bird in the early spring, late 

 summer, and autumn in this country, Spain, Epirus, 

 Sicily, and Cyprus, leads me to consider it a much 

 less reed- and bush-haunting species than the Water- 

 Rail, though the nest appears to be often, if not 

 generally, situated amongst reeds. I have almost 

 always found the Crake in open rush-grown meadows, 

 or on sedgy margins of streams and ditches, also in 

 great abundance in October on the muddy shores of 

 the Bay of Butrinto, in Epirus, amongst a low- 

 growing gummy plant (the name of which I have 

 forgotten) that is very common in such localities in 

 Mediterranean countries. 



I have never myself met with a nest of this Crake, 

 probably for want of determined search ; it is de- 

 scribed as being large for the size of the bird, and 

 composed of the leaves of water-plants, reed, sedge, 

 &c. The number of eggs appears to average from 

 eight to ten ; they vary a good deal in ground-colour 

 and markings, but may be roughly described as of 

 a pale buff, with irregular blotches and specks of 

 various shades of reddish brown, and what may be 

 called " stains " of dark grey. These Crakes are very 

 noisy and have a variety of cries, some of which bear 

 a slight resemblance to those of the Waterhen, thongh 

 of course not so powerful ; their common spring call 

 always reminded me of the single note of the Pied 

 Woodpecker, but is not so harsh. In the great 

 marshes near Catania, I often noticed that a gunshot 

 w^ould set off these birds and several allied species 

 screaming, twittering, and whistling for some minutes, 

 in the same way that a distant clap of thunder, the 



T 



