392 
ALECTORIDES. 
above the shallow water, and slightly hollowed. The leaves of the cat-tail flag seem 
to be the favorite material used in its construction-. From six to eight is the usual 
number of eggs, and these are light yellowish brown, spotted and splashed with dark 
brown, and varying in length from 1.67 to 1.80 inches, and in breadth from 1.17 to 
1.25 inches. When driven from her nest, the female bird skulks a short distance 
through the herbage, and then with head erect and expanded tail she ivalks slowly 
away. 
Mr. Moore found this species nesting in Florida on the 20tli of April. One nest, 
containing ten eggs, was in a tussock of grass a few inches above the water, quite 
exposed from above and on all sides, and was made of blades of grass and lined with 
the same. The eggs were taken, and on the second day the nest was found to con- 
tain another egg, just laid ; and a day or two later a second one was discovered on a 
tussock near by. It is possible that two birds together laid these twelve eggs. 
Another nest — only just begun when found — was visited daily till the young were 
seen to leave it ; this was on the 20th of May. Before this nest was finished an egg 
was laid in it, and material was added after as many as three eggs had been laid, the 
total being six. The first was laid on the 22d of April, and the sixth on the 30th. 
This nest was quite unlike the other. It was placed in a close collection of Ponte- 
derias, and was formed almost entirely of their leaves. Some were bent down to form 
the bed of the nest ; others were bent in a like manner for a rude canopy over it ; 
others were divided, and used to raise the sides of the nest and to finish it. Most of 
the materials were used in a green state. The leaves of this plant are spongy, and on 
losing their vitality shrink to a mere trifle of their living bulk ; and this may have 
occasioned the additions made to the nest. 
The ground-color of the eggs varies from a dark cream to a light buff, the depth of 
the coloring being affected by the influence of the materials of the nest. When first 
laid, and unstained, the ground-color is a creamy white. The markings are usually 
scattered, small, and rounded, of bright reddish brown, and lighter and fainter stains 
of purplish slate. Two specimens of the egg of this bird (No. 1278) collected in 
Minnesota by Mr. B. F. Goss, are of oval shape, one end but very slightly larger 
than the other ; one measures 1.80 inches in length by 1.25 inches in breadth, the 
other 1.70 by 1.30 inches. 
Genus FULICA, Linn^us. 
Fulica, Linn. S. N. ed. 10, 1758, 152 ; ed. 12, 1. 1766, 257 (type, F. atra, Linn.). 
Char. Very similar to Gallimda, but the toes margined by a broad, deeply scalloped lateral 
membrane. Bill shorter than the head, straight, strong, compressed, and advancing into the feathers 
of the forehead, where it frequently forms a wide and somewhat projecting frontal plate; nostrils 
in a groove, with a large membrane, near the middle of the lull. Wings rather short, second and 
third quills usually longest ; tail very short ; tarsus robust, shorter than the middle toe, with very 
distinct transverse scales ; toes long, each having semicircular lobes, larger on the inner side ; hind 
toe rather long, lobed. 
Almost the only difference between Fulica and Gallimda consists in the single character of the 
toes, as pointed out above. The two genera are, however, quite distinct, since there appears to be 
no species known that is intermediate in the character of the feet. 
Leaving out the remarkable F. cornuta , Bonap., which has been made the type of a distinct 
genus 1 — and we think properly so — there are known six American species of Fidica, whose char- 
1 Lyconns, Bonap. Ann. Sc. Nat. ser. 4, Zool. I. 46 (1854). 
