BIRDS.- 349 



posite side, so as to raise a bank. Trees of a brittle 

 structure were often broken off by them. 



We Ipave our readers to ponder these things witli- 

 out any comment of ours. 



The rev. Mr. Harris, of Massachusetts, in his 

 " Tour to the State of Ohio," gives an account equal- 

 ly curious, of the pigeon roosts in that state. 



The following account of the manners of the 

 %uoGdcock C scolopax rustic ola^l^, J when pairing in 

 the Spring, by the late Robert Milligan, Esq. of 

 Wilmington, Delaware, cannot fail to prove highly 

 interesting. 



About forty minutes after sun- set, we arrived 

 at the spot where we expected to hear the wood- 

 cocks. 



Presently we heard 'several, in different direc- 

 tions, cafling in a note that sounded like the word 

 quake^ pronounced long. We attended particularly 

 to one, that seemed, from his note, to be about one 

 hundred yards from us, in an open field. The grass 

 was long, and the light beginning to fade, we could 

 not distinguish him very well. 



After calling five or six times, pausing eight or 

 ten seconds between each call, he ascended into the 

 air in an oblique course, till he rose two or three 

 hundred yards above the field ; there he continued 

 several minutes flying in a circle, and singing in a 

 beautiful manner. As he descended, he narrowed 

 his circle, and varied his note, till he came within 

 one hundred yards of the ground, when he threw 

 himself perpendicularly down to the spot v/hence 

 he had risen. He repeated these flights several 

 times, calling eight or ten times between each flight; 

 H h 2 



