RAIL., 
241 
fly with great rapidity, as I have myself frequently witnessed, 
should be incapable of migrating, like so many others, over 
extensive tracts of land or sea ? Inhabiting, as they do, the 
remote regions of Hudson’s Bay, where it is impossible they 
could subsist during the rigours of their winter, they must 
either emigrate from thence or perish ; and as the same places 
in Pennsylvania which abound with them in October, are often 
laid under ice and snow during the winter, it is as impossible 
that they could exist here in that inclement season : Heaven 
has, therefore, given them, in common with many others, 
certain prescience of these circumstances, and judgment, as 
well as strength of flight, sufficient to seek more genial 
climates abounding with their suitable food. 
The Rail is nine inches long, and fourteen inches in extent ; 
bill, yellow, blackish towards the point ; lores, front, crown, 
chin, and stripe down the throat, black ; line over the eye, 
cheeks, and breast, fine light ash ; sides of the crown, neck, 
and upper parts generally, olive brown, streaked with black, 
and also with long lines of pure white, the feathers being 
centred with black on a brown olive ground, and edged with 
white ; these touches of white are shorter near the shoulder 
of the wing, lengthening as they descend ; wing, plain olive 
brown ; tertials, streaked with black, and long lines of white ; 
tail, pointed, dusky olive brown, centred with black ; the four 
middle feathers bordered for half their length with lines of 
white ; lower part of the breast marked with semicircular lines 
of white, on a light ash ground ; belly, white ; sides under the 
wings, deep olive, barred with black, white, and reddish buff ; 
vent, brownish buff ; legs, feet, and naked part of the thighs, 
yellowish green ; exterior edge of the wing, white ; eyes, 
reddish hazel. 
The females, and young of the first season, have the throat 
white, the breast pale brown, and little or no black on the 
head. The males may always be distinguished by their ashy 
blue breasts and black throats. 
During the greater part of the months of September and 
October, the market of Philadelphia is abundantly supplied 
VOL. II. 
o 
