Whip-poor-will, ( Caprimulciu s vofiife - 
rus,) May 14, as I was passing through aj 
young pine wood, a Whip-poor-will started 
up almost at my feet, and flying a few 
yards lay on the ground fluttering its out- 
spread wings. The two white eggs, spot- 
ted with brown and lilac, were soon dis- 
covered and incubation was found to have 
begun. June 1, found a nest with one 
young a few days old, and a stale egg and 
the next day discovered another with the 
same contents! June 5, an old bird start- 
ed up a few feet ahead of me, but the two 
little brown birds so resembled the leaves 
on which they lay, that I had to make a 
close search on my knees to find them. 
The four nests found were each in a clump 
of young trees, and were composed of old, 
dry leaves, just as they had fallen from 
the trees. Does it often happen that one 
egg is barren '? 
o.&o. IX. Deo. 18 S 4 , p, /*r. 
The Whippoorwill at Raleigh, N. C. 
BY C. S. BRIMLEY. 
A tew particulars concerning our past year’s 
experience with this bird may be of some inter- 
est to some of the readers of the O. and O., 
and as an introduction 1 will first give a few 
data concerning the species : 
The Whippoorwill arrives here about the 18tli 
of April with tolerable uniformity, and from 
that time till the end of May its notes may be 
nightly heard by all who are near enough to 
its favorite haunts. From June on it is seldom 
heard and I cannot give the time of its leaving 
us but we have on one occasion taken it as late 
as October 10th. While here it seems to fre- 
quent the higher and dryer woods, and it is 
only in such localities there is any chance of 
finding it. This year it was first observed on 
April 18th ; five days afterwards I was follow- 
ing some Towhees in a strip of woods on a 
rocky ridge running north, when a bird that at 
first I took to be an unusually large Towhee 
flew up almost from under my feet. I soon, 
however, recognized him as a Whippoorwill, 
and seeing him settle within easy shot I 
straightway collected him. 
On May 5th my brother was collecting in a 
patch of woods on the same ridge, when a pair 
of Whippoorwills flew up almost from under 
his feet; he immediately collected one and then 
started to look for eggs. His search was soon 
crowned with success, for within a few feet of 
OLOGIST [Yol. 12-No. 9 
where the birds had flown from, lay two eggs 
in a slight depression among the dead leaves. 
The eggs, however, to our disgust, were within 
a few hours of hatching and we were unable to 
save them. Next day I went to look for the 
other Whippoorwill and scared him up within 
a few feet of where my brother had taken the 
eggs and forthwith added him to our stock. 
(This one proved a male; the female was shot 
the previous day) . 
On May 18th 1 was again collecting on the 
same wooded ridge, some half mile soutli of 
where my brother had taken the eggs, when as 
I was slowly making my way through bushes, 
briars and dead brush, a Whippoorwill flew up 
from a comparatively open space before me, 
and sitting on a fallen tree trunk commenced 
beating her wings, at the same time giving 
vent to a muilled booming sound, swelling her 
throat as she did so. I backed far enough to 
save her from utter annihilation on firing and 
then collected her with a warbler load. I 
found, however, that 1 had scarcely retired far 
enough as more feathers were shot away than 
was necessary or ornamental. 
After bagging the bird, I commenced to look 
for eggs and presently found a downy little 
chick faintly chirping among the dead leaves; 
I collected him and noticing that he was in no 
depression whatever, extended my search and 
within too feet was the nest, or rather the de- 
pression, containing a single egg which I fond- 
ly hoped was addled, but my hopes were dis- 
appointed as a marked star showed itself on 
one side and a faint chirp was heard through 
the shell. I managed to preserve the hatched 
chick and its mother but not the hatching one. 
Thus nest number two produced no eggs but 
only a little yellow chick. Nine days after on 
May 27th, my brother was again collecting in 
the same patch of woods where he had found 
the first nest. He again scared up a Whippoor- 
will; this time in the opposite corner of the 
woods, and again collected it, on looking for 
eggs, however, he found none but noticed a 
slight depression among the leaves which he 
thought might be an intended nest and presume 
it was, forjudge of our disgust when dissection 
showed that two or three days more would 
have sufficed to give us a fresh set of two eggs. 
This concludes our season’s experience with 
the Whippoorwill and its nest, and X think all 
Oologists will agree with me that it is to say 
the least, mortifying to have been three times 
within the same month so near getting a set of 
Whippoorwill’s eggs, and yet be a few days 
too early or late as we were. 
O.&O. XII. Sept. 1887 p . Afy. 
