NIGHTJAR. 
scats or chairs, and more than once from flower-beds, as well as garden-paths. This has usually occurred soon 
after their arrival or shortly before their departure in the autumn. 
On fine still nights the Nightjar may often be seen rising from the centre of a dusty road, dashing out of 
sight for a moment or two, and again coming into view as it settles at a short distance further ahead. This 
curious performance is supposed to be induced by the habit of dusting itself, in which the bird is said to 
indulge. It is quite possible that this may be the case, though, owing to the darkness, I was never able 
to ascertain its actions on the ground. 
During the autumn months the Nightjar may frequently be observed at dusk darting round the chimneys 
and up and down the streets of towns in the neighbourhood of the sea-coast. I distinctly watched one of 
these birds, through the gloom of an impending storm, alight on the roof of a house in Yarmouth ; the 
position it took up was lengthways on a ridge-tile. 
The remarkable serrated claw on the centre toe of this species is frequently supposed by country people to 
assist the bird in clearing the scales or down of the moths it captures from its mouth and bristles. For my 
own part, I am of opinion that the true use of this singularly formed claw has not yet been discovered. 
As the sun disappears the well-known whirring note of the Nightjar maybe heard resounding far and 
near through its haunts. Perched on the limb of a tree in the outskirts of a dense covert or a straggling 
plantation, the bird gives utterance to the strange jarring sounds that, even when listened to at a short distance, 
appear as they rise and fall in the silence of the wood, now loud and then almost imperceptible, to spring first 
from one quarter and the next moment from an entirely opposite direction. A warm still evening in June is 
the time to study the note of this singular bird; in cold, wet, or stormy weather, when the wind whistles 
through the trees, the note of the Nightjar may be awaited in vain, or, at most, a single whirr will be detected 
in some sheltered corner. 
The food of this species consists, I believe, entirely of moths, beetles, and other nocturnal insects. It is 
not only perfectly harmless, but most useful in clearing off a superabundance of destructive insects. Five- 
and-twenty or thirty years ago I have heard one or two keepers in the southern counties declare they were 
allied to the Hawk tribe, and the poor birds suffered in consequence. This exceedingly mistaken idea has, 
I believe, now entirely disappeared, and for years I have never, either in England or Scotland, met with a 
single guardian of the preserves who was not perfectly acquainted with their habits. 
Nightjar and Goatsucker arc the commonest of the titles by which this species is known. In some 
localities it is styled the Nighthawk, Evejar, and Fern-Owl. The reason for the appellation of Goatsucker is 
too ridiculous to need a word of explanation. 
The two curiously marbled eggs of this species are placed either on a clearing in the wood or thicket the 
bird frequents, or on an open spot on a moor or down. There is usually some shelter from bush, bank, or low 
shrub within a few feet of the spot where they arc deposited. With the exception of a dead leaf or two, or a 
strand of grass carried by the wind and lodged in the slight natural hollow the bird makes use of, there is not 
the least suspicion of a nest. 
The Plate shows a female with two young ones newly hatched. It is taken from a rough sketch made 
of the group in a grassy valley among the South Downs between Lewes and Brighton. The eggs had 
been laid on the slope of a hill facing the south, and were sheltered from above by a thick and spreading 
furze bush. 
