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ducted to a place of safety by the male bird ; whilst the female remains about the 
nest, manifesting as much alarm at your presence as if her brood was actually 
there. 
The young birds have a very grotesque appearance, with black bodies, red 
heads, and white bills ; with yellow down sticking to their heads and necks on first 
quitting the nest. When they are in danger the parents swim anxiously round 
the object of alarm, uttering low chucks, and sometimes a kind of bark; in pro¬ 
ducing this latter note the beak is opened as wide as it will permit. The common 
call-note of the Coot is a loud, chucking, mournful note, which may at times be 
heard issuing from a dozen different parts of the lake. I have likewise known it 
emit a noise resembling that of a Fowl before laying. 
In general the Coot is rather a shy bird, but in some places, as at Sudbury, 
they are extremely familiar; and if you sit down near the edge of the water, and 
remain quiet a short time, they will swim up to reconnoitre you, without the 
slightest indications of alarm : and their peculiar habits and attitudes are then 
studied with ease. When swimming it never flirts up its tail, like the Gallinule, 
but moves its head backwards and forwards, often erecting the feathers of its 
whole body, and setting up its wings in the manner of the Swan. The Coot has 
a heavy body and short wings, and is, therefore, little adapted for flight. When¬ 
ever it attempts to rise into the air, which is but seldom, the feet are allowed to 
trail in the water, as if it were unwilling to leave its favourite element even for a 
moment. It always preens its feathers in the water, and occasionally tumbles over 
in this element in a most remarkable manner, and apparently with no other view 
than for its own amusement. When it has a nest to guard, it seems entirely to 
lose all shyness and fear of man, and is by no means easily driven off when sitting, 
and will even allow itself to be touched gently with a stick, but with true birdish 
wisdom endeavouring to cover its head. If the female is disturbed the male 
(which, at that season, remains “ within call”) immediately swims up, and becomes 
so bold as to approach within a few yards of where you are standing. On your 
leaving the place the male generally follows to a considerable distance, as if to 
attract your attention ; while the female slily enters her nest on the other side of 
the patch of herbage in which it is situated. If she is again disturbed she quits 
her nest much less reluctantly than before; but, however often she may be driven 
off in the course of a single day, I have never known her desert her charge, as so 
frequently happens with the Gallinule. 
When the Coot leaves its nest it never covers the eggs ; and I have often 
been surprised that the eggs and young of this and other aquatic species are 
not more frequently plundered by the Water Rat, with which the aquatic plants 
abound, than appears to be the case; but after many years close observation 
of these birds I have never discovered, with certainty, that they were molested 
by this quadruped. As the bird often quits its nest for a considerable time, 
