SPOTTED CRAKE. 
375 
grallatob.es. 
RALLIDjE. 
SPOTTED CRAKE, 
SPOTTED GALLINULE. WATER-CRAKE. 
Crex PORZANA. 
PLATE CYI. PIG. II. 
Mr. J. Hancock, whose collection of the eggs of British 
birds is the best in this country, has a beautiful series of 
the eggs of this species, obtained by him during a bird-nest¬ 
ing excursion through the fenny districts of the counties 
of Cambridge and Huntingdon,—some collected on the 
borders of Whittlesea Mere, but chiefly in Yaxley Fen; to 
him I am indebted for the following information:—The 
eggs of the Spotted Crake, as well as those of the water- 
rail, which are met with in exactly similar situations, are 
in ordinary seasons very difficult to obtain, the nest being 
placed in a thick bed of reeds, which covers a large ex¬ 
tent of country, growing to a height of six or seven feet, 
and therefore not easily penetrated. It happened that 
the year of which I am speaking had been unusually wet, 
and that the fen country had been covered with water, so 
that both these species, which had had their nests swamped^ 
and their eggs and young ones destroyed during the usual 
breeding-season in the beginning of May, were a second 
time engaged in incubation, at the time of Mr. Hancock’s 
visit in July, which was also the season during which the 
femnen were mowing the reeds, and uncovering the nests 
