154 
YELLOW-BREASTED RAIL. 
One which I opened was filled with minute fresh-water shell-fish and 
gravel. They feed also on insects of various kinds, and the seeds of grasses. 
My friend Thomas Nuttall has so well described the notes of this bird, 
that I cannot do better than present you with his account of them. “ On 
the 6th of October, 1831, .having spent the night in a lodge, on the borders 
of Fresh Pond, employed for decoying and shooting Ducks, I heard, about 
sunrise, the Yellow-breasted Rails begin to stir among the reeds (Arundo 
Phragmites ) that thickly skirt this retired border of the lake, and in which, 
among a host of various kinds of Blackbirds, they had/or some time roosted 
every night. As soon as awake, they called out in an abrupt and cackling 
cry, ’/crek, ’/crek, ’ krek , ’ kre/c , ’/cuk' lc'lch, which note, apparently from the 
young, was answered by the parent (probably the hen) in a lower soothing 
note. The whole of these uncouth and guttural notes have no bad resem- 
blance to the croaking of the tree frog, as to sound. This call and answer, 
uttered every morning, is thus kept up for several minutes in various tones, 
till the whole family, separated for the night, have met and satisfactorily 
recognised each other.” 
I once shot a female bird of this species near New Orleans upon which I 
had nearly trodden as she was on the nest and about to lay an egg, and 
which she dropped as she flew before me, previously to my touching the 
trigger. In August and September I have found this species uncommonly 
fat, and most delicious. The difficulty of procuring them, however, renders 
them a rarity for the table even in those parts of the country where they 
are most abundant. 
I have no doubt that a few stragglers now and then go far north to breed, 
as I find in the Fauna Boreali- Americana the following note from Mr. Hut- 
chins’s manuscripts : — “ This elegant bird is an inhabitant of the marshes 
(on the coast of Hudson’s Bay, near the efflux of Severn river, where Mr. 
Hutchins resided) from the middle of May to the end of September. It 
never flies above sixty yards at a time, but runs with great rapidity among 
the long grass near the shores. In the morning and evening it utters a 
note, which resembles the striking of a flint and steel ; at other times it 
makes a shrieking noise. It builds no nest, but lays from ten to sixteen 
perfectly white eggs among the grass.” 
Now, this making no nest is to me a convincing proof that the species is 
not there in its natural place, but finding itself pushed for time, and yet 
obliged to breed, is contented to do so under unfavourable circumstances. 
Dr. Richardson, who spent several years in the northern parts of America, 
did not meet with this species. I saw none in Labrador or Newfoundland ; 
and in the British provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, the only 
bird of this family known is the Sora, Ortygometra carolinus. 
