THE WOODCOCK. 
803 
When the ceremony of pairing is over, the female 
retires to some quiet secluded spot as far as possible 
from the haunts of men, and seeks amongst grasses, 
behind a small bush or trunk of a tree, a natural hollow, 
or in default of this makes one herself, which she scantily 
lines with such soft materials as the immediate neighbour¬ 
hood affords. By the month of May, if the breeding bird 
be flushed, this inartistic nest is always found to contain 
four smooth eggs, not shiny, of a pale rusty yellow colour, 
marked with yellow-brown blotches and specks. The 
female alone incubates, and sits very close; the eggs are 
hatched in from sixteen to seventeen days. It is only 
when repeatedly disturbed that she will forsake her nest, 
and she will return again even after an egg has been 
abstracted. The male, on the contrary, seems to care very 
little for the eggs, though his affection for the young- 
birds is very great; the latter are the prettiest little 
creatures imaginable, and their brown and white-spotted 
downy dress becomes them well. They leave the nest 
almost as soon as they are hatched, sometimes with pieces 
of the egg-shell still sticking to them, and are, as may 
be imagined, exposed to many dangers during their 
chickenhood. The colour of their plumage, which closely 
resembles that of the ground, is their principal protection. 
When one sees both the old birds rise, and hears them 
utter an anxious “ dac, dac,” and then suddenly alight, it 
is a sure sign that they have their young with them; 
these are, however, but rarely found, no matter how 
carefully they may be sought for, because when they 
squat they seem immediately transformed into patches of 
moss or lichen. Bight days after their entrance into the 
world the feathers begin to peep through the down, and 
a fortnight later the young are almost fully fledged, 
