WADING BIRDS. 
184 
According to Wilson, these Rails arrive on the coast of New 
Jersey about the 20th of April, and probably winter within the 
southern boundaries of the Union, or in the marshes along the 
extensive coast of the Mexican Gulf, as they are seen by Feb- 
ruary on the shores of Georgia in great numbers. In the 
course of their migrations, in the hours of twilight, they are 
often heard on their way, in the spring, by fishermen and 
coasters. Their general residence is in salt-marshes, occa- 
sionally penetrating a short distance up the large rivers as far 
as the bounds of tide-water. In the vast flat and grassy 
marshes of New Jersey, intersected by innumerable tide- 
water ditches, their favorite breeding-resorts, they are far 
more numerous than all the other marsh-fowl collectively. 
The arrival of the Mud Hen (another of their common 
appellations) is soon announced through all the marshes by 
its loud, harsh, and incessant cackle, heard principally in the 
night, and is most frequent at the approach of a storm. About 
the middle of May the females commence laying, dropping 
the first egg into a slight cavity scratched for its reception, 
and lined with a small portion of dry grass, as may be con- 
venient. During the progress of laying the complement of 
about ten eggs, the nest is gradually increased until it attains 
about the height of a foot, — a precaution or instinct which 
seems either to contemplate the possibility of an access of the 
tide-water, or to be a precaution to conceal the eggs or young, 
as the interest in their charge increases. And indeed to con- 
ceal the whole with more success, the long sedge grass is 
artfully brought together in an arch or canopy ; but however 
this art and ingenuity may succeed in ordinary cases, it only 
serves to expose the nest to the search of the fowler, who can 
thus distinguish their labors at a considerable distance. The 
eggs, more than an inch in breadth, and about one and three 
fourths in length, are of the usual oval figure, of a yellowish 
white or dull cream color sparingly spotted with brown red 
and a few other interspersed minute touches of a subdued 
tint bordering on lilac purple ; as usual, there are very few 
spots but towards the obtuse end. The eggs are much 
