918 
HYDR0PI1 ASIAN U S CIIIRURGTTS. 
awake by it. It flies very well, and, when occasion calls for it, takes long flights. I have seen little flocks 
crossing the wide Bolgodde Lake at sundown, bent for some distant roosting-place : they flew just above the 
water, in close company, going along with considerable speed. The Water-Pheasant likewise swims well, and when 
on the water sits very buoyantly. If wounded it is almost impossible to procure, as it immediately dives, and, as 
J erdon truly says, remains immersed with its bill only out of the water, and defies pursuit. Though socially 
inclined, these handsome birds do not keep very close company, but move about, each intent on its own 
business, at some little distance from one another. They feed on the seeds of water-plants and on grain when 
frequenting paddy-fields : in addition to such diet I have found small shrimps in the stomachs of some 
specimens ; and Blyth states that some he kept in confinement throve well on them, and were rather quarrel- 
some among themselves. Swinhoe justly remarks that when sitting they look dark and unnoticeable ; but 
the wings once expanded they become conspicuous white objects. Their flight is somewhat peculiar, for 
though there is more time than is usually the case between each stroke of the wing, the beat is in itself very 
quickly performed. Their gait and deportment are quite different from those of the Rails. 
J erdon has the following note with regard to some of the natives of India and this bird : — “ In Purneah 
the natives say that before the inundation, i. e. during the breeding-season, it calls dub, dub, i. e. ‘ go under 
water/ and afterwards, in the cold weather, powar, powar, which, in Purneah dialect, means ‘ next year.’ ” 
Although the Singhalese idea of its note being like the mewing of a cat is not inapt, yet it must be said 
that there is but a slight resemblance in the tone of its cry to the voice of this quadruped j it is a much 
louder and rounder sound, and has a certain amount of intonation in it which would seem very strange issuing 
from a feline throat. 
Nidification. — In the north-west of Ceylon this bird breeds in March and April : my friend Mr. Jeffreys, 
of Hindugalla Estate, informs me that he once found an egg deposited on a floating Lotus-leaf, the incubation 
of which was being performed by the sun ; for at a little distance off the bird was watching it, and sallied out 
at a Brahminy Kite which flew over the spot. Two eggs taken by Mr. E. Creasey in the Jaffna district, and 
examined by me in the collection of Mr. MacVicar, were excessively pyriform in shape, showing the bird’s 
affinity to the Scolopacidce, very smooth in texture, and of a uniform deep olive colour. They measured l - 46 
by 1 '02 inch and l - 36 by 103 respectively. 
Mr. Hume writes thus of the nest of this Jacana : — “ They lay from the middle of June till August; the 
nest (placed in any pond, jheel, or swamp, just as often on the outskirts of some village or small town as in 
amongst fields and jungle) is often a mass of weeds and rushes heaped together in the water, in the midst of 
the thickest grass and rice, and so low that the eggs are half-immersed in water. Occasionally the nests are 
amongst the grass of some little island, and then they are much slighter. At times, even when constructed 
in the water, they are so small as hardly to be able to contain the egg — -little, shallow, circular cups of rush 
and water-weed on floating Lotus-leaves or tufts of water-grass.” The eggs are laid point to point like the 
Snipe’s aud Plover’s, aud four is the usual number. The same writer says the eggs may be best described as 
pegtops without the pegs — cones slightly obtuse at the point, based upon somewhat flattened hemispheres ; and 
lie remarks likewise that the colour varies a good deal. They are rich deep bronze, sometimes a greenish and 
sometimes a more rufous-bronze colour ; they become bleached by the suu occasionally to a stone-colour. 
They vary much in size, but average “ P46 by 112 inch.” 
