1898 
May 21 
" Tl^Kicker " 
reappears 
on Great 
Meadow 
********** * 
On the evening of May 18th I heard soon after dark 
what I felt nearly sure was our old friend the "Kicker" 
( Porzana ? jamaicensis ?) and on the two following nights 
the same bird was singing in the same place — the lower end 
of Great Meadow about opposite Bensen’s Landing. On all three 
occasions the wind and the clamor of the Toads and Frogs 
made it difficult to get the full song and as I missed the 
terminal "crow" I thought it possible that the notes were 
uttered by the Virginia Rail, although I have never heard 
this bird give more than two "kiks" whereas this call had at 
least five or six. But to-night at about 11 P. M. the whole 
song came distinctly to my ears as I lay in bed and I heard 
a dozen times or more the ki-ki-ki-ki, ki-ke^er of our mys¬ 
terious nocturnal songster which was so abundant in Middlesex 
County in the spring of 1889 and which I heard the following 
summer at Falmouth and here at the cabin in June, 1892. 
Evidently he has again taken up his residence in the Great 
Meadow. Thus far I have not once heard him until night has 
fairly closed in. 
