THE WHITE-BREASTED WATER-HEN 
He was told to collect one example, and one only, of tlie 
ayam-ayam and being" selfish and fond of tlie birds that loiter 
about our own garden we decided that it would be well to 
take a bird from a place remote from our own house. 
The collector was therefore, told to go and search some 
flat, damp ground at the back of a friend's house, situated 
well out of the town, until he got a specimen. For several 
days nothing happened but no notice was taken of the Dyak's 
non-appearance because it is almost an axiom in collecting 
that if you want a common thing, be it bird or butterfly, then 
that particular species immediately becomes temporarily 
scarce ! 
The public-spirited gentleman to whom the house belonged 
called to see us and gave it as Ids opinion that the Dyak was 
lazy rascal for he had done nothing but sit down in one 
place (and smoke) for two or three days and had made no 
attempt to find the bird we wanted. Our friend however was 
quite SYrong* for, to cut a long story short, not only did tlie 
cunning^, patient collector get the water-hen but in three days 
he got three other species of rails, not a bad piece of work 
for Sing^apore where one usually sees but the Hypottrnidia 
striata described in our last chapter. The other two species 
then obtained were the ruddy crake (Limnabitnus fusciis) and 
another small rail known as FolioHmnas cincretts^ Both of 
these are small species* considerably smaller than the blue- 
breasted rail in fact. Broadly speaking the ruddy crake is 
brown all over, darkest on the back and brightest, ahnost 
reddish-chestnut, below. The legs are red. The other small 
rail, which we can call the sand^vich rail, is brown above but 
wdiite tinged with pale slate below; the legs are greenish. 
Both these species may be still common in Singapore, the latter 
almost certainly is, but they are diflicult birds to observe- 
Yet two other typical rails must be mentioned. They are 
very similar in appearance both being about the size of the 
Enghsh water-rail. The upper parts are brown, the underside 
of the head and the breast bright chestnut and the rest of 
undeq>arts boldly barred with black and white. Of these 
Rallina sitperc'diatis has the legs greenish-black while those of 
Raliina fasciaia are bright red. Both birds have been 
recorded from Singapore and we have seen Railim fasciata 
[73] 
