but should the chick of a Fowl or Pheasant or a duckling cross his path, a single stroke of his pointed hill 
lays the little innocent dead at his feet, almost without a kick or struggle ; and many losses to the keeper 
and the housewife have occurred which are not charged to the Moorhen. I was first made aware of this 
habit of the bird by one of the keepers of Sir S. Morton Peto, Bart., at Somerleyton ; shortly afterwards I 
read a similar statement in the ‘Zoologist;’ and in order to determine the truth of these assertions, I 
inquired of James Hunt, one of the keepers of the Zoological Society, if such a habit in the bird had come 
under his notice ; and I soon found all I had previously heard was true to the very letter. The following 
is his reply : — 
“ In answer to your inquiries respecting the Moorhens in the ponds in these Gardens, I beg to say they 
have always been very annoying and often destructive to young ducks. I have known them to kill 
several of a hatch, and partly to pull them to pieees. If the old duck attempts to assist them, the Moorhen 
immediately attacks, and sometimes mounts on her back, and continues tormenting her until she shakes it 
off by main strength, or dives under water, and so gets clear. The Moorhen often takes possession of the 
nest-boxes fixed in the ponds, and builds her nest therein, when no bird, not even a Goose, dare approach 
within some yards of it ; in fact, the greater part of the time of the Moorhen during the breeding-season is 
taken up in annoying and tormenting the other birds in the pond.” 
The following interesting extract from the ‘Zoologist’ must close this part of the Moorhen’s history. 
“At the heginning of July,” says H. J. Partridge, Esq., of Hockham Hall, near Thetford, in Norfolk, “the 
keeper having lost several Pheasants about three weeks old, from a copse, and having set traps in vain for 
winged and four-footed vermin, determined to keep watch for the aggressor, when, after some time, a Moor- 
hen was seen walking about near the copse ; the keeper supposing that it only came to eat the young 
Pheasants’ food, did not shoot it until he saw the Moorhen strike a Pheasant, which it killed immediately, 
and devoured all the young bird, except the leg- and wing-bones. The remains agreed exactly with those 
of eight found before. Perfect confidence may be placed in the correctness of this statement.” 
After this, let me say something more pleasing respecting the Moorhen, but before so doing direct the 
reader’s attention to the accompanying Plate, whereon is depicted a newly hatched brood, one of three or four 
which are annually produced. That they are beautiful and interesting, no one, I think, will gainsay ; yet how 
seldom are they seen, and how little is the colouring of the bird during the first few days of its existence 
known ! This may be attributed to two causes — one the situations in which the nest is placed, the other the 
very short period (at most four or five days) during which this peculiar colouring is retained. Immediately on 
emerging from the shell, these infant birds take to the water, and follow their parents throiigh labyrinths of 
thiek and tangled herbage, at one part of the day sunning themselves on the prostrate rushes, at another 
threading the floating leaves of the water-lilies, both yellow and white ; as night approaches, their sensitive- 
ness to cold prompts them to seek shelter under the wings of the eareful mother : the clucking male is now 
assiduously attentive, and protects both her and her progeny from danger, flirts his white tail, and exhibits 
evident signs of pleasure. These newly-hatched chicks, which a few hours previously were breathlessly 
imprisoned within the hard shell, have sprung into life with all the active energies of their parents, and, 
uttering a cheeping note, follow them about, swimming over the glassy pool, scrambling over the floating 
reeds in pursuit of insects, with the quickness of thought, and avoiding danger hy diving beneath the surface 
with remarkable adroitness. From this period a great change takes place ; for as the bird increases in size, 
feathers take the place of the downy covering, the eharacteristie colouring being olive-browm above and 
hoary white beneath, particularly on the throat and under surface ; the bill now becomes of a uniform olive- 
green, a colour which it retains for the first year; after this, or in the second year, the adult livery is 
assumed, the feathers become more glossy, the bill assumes its brilliant hues of red and yellow, and the gaily 
coloured garter offers a conspicuous contrast to the yellow'ish green of the legs ; the eye is now more in 
unison wdth the red of the bill and the frontal plate, and the Moorhens are in their finest attire — both sexes 
alike in their colouring, to a shade, even to the red and yellow bill. The average w^eight of several individuals 
was from 13 to 15 ounces, the lighter birds alw'ays being females. What more can I say respecting this well- 
known denizen of our marshes, the companion of the Will-o’-the-wisp ? perhaps more wwld be tedious to the 
reader ; with a description of its flight, its food, and its nest and eggs, I shall therefore close the Moorhen’s 
history. Its wing-powers are not great, still they are sufficient to transport the bird from one part of the 
river to another, and for its nightly sallies, which are made known to all who live on the sides of rivers by 
the peculiar cry it emits while flying overhead, when darkness shrouds the object that gives utterance to it 
from our view : this is the voiee of the Moorhen. His food consists of aquatic insects and their larvae, 
mollusks of various kinds, every species of grain, and the shoots of young wheat or other cereals. The nest 
is sometimes placed on the flat branch of a tree, at others on stumps near the water’s edge, among reeds, or on 
large floating masses of weeds. It is usually made of rushes, and is somewhat carelessly constructed. The 
eggs, which are from six to eight or nine in number, are of a reddish white, thinly spotted and speckled with 
dull orange-brown ; they are one inch and eight lines long by one inch three lines hroad. 
Tlie Plate represents male, female, and brood, about life-size. The plant is the Nymphoea alba. 
