GREAT PLOYER. 
19 
Bev. Gilbert White, too, records that in 1788, he heard one 
on the 27th. of February. One was shot near Thetford, in 
Norfolk, the 9th. of December, 1831, by Mr. J. D. Salmon; 
and another at Ludham, on the 15th. of December, 1846. 
In general they are seen singly, or at the most in pairs, 
in spring. They migrate in the autumn in the small numbers 
of the respective families. They repair to water every evening 
to drink and to wash themselves. They are easily tamed, and 
kept in gardens, and seem to become attached to their keepers, 
and are said to live to a great age: naturally they are very 
wild and shy. 
William Hewet, Esq., of Beading, has sent me several 
particulars of these birds. The young, even when fledged, will 
squat, and allow themselves to be picked up. If disturbed 
from the nest, the parent runs off very swiftly with the head 
stooped. The young ones are very good eating, but the old 
birds are dry and tough. 
They fly swiftly on occasion, and with much power, but 
low, though often at a considerable height during the night; 
they also run extremely fast. The legs are held out behind 
in flight. In the day-time they generally lie at rest near 
some stone, clod, or other sheltering projection, or stand on 
one leg with the head buried in the feathers. 
They feed on beetles and other insects, worms and slugs, 
and swallow pieces of stone to aid digestion. 
Their cry may be heard sometimes through a summer’s night 
from the fallow fields, and there is something peculiarly striking 
in their wild wail; so at least I used to deem it: ‘Sweet was 
the music to my ear’ in the ‘joyous days of old.’ Buffon 
renders it by the word ‘turrlui,’ and Meyer by ‘dit,’ ‘dillit,’ 
and ‘krseeet,’ which latter it utters chiefly during the evening 
and night when on the wing, and but rarely in the day. It 
is also rendered by the syllables ‘cur-lew,’ whence one of its 
vernacular names; the other I suppose, being derived from its 
frequenting stony places. 
The bare earth is the nest, among weather-worn stones. The 
male appears to sit as well as the female, the time of incubation 
being sixteen or seventeen days. The young are led about by 
the female almost as soon as hatched, that is to say, on the 
day following their birth; at first the old birds take great 
care of them. 
The eggs are pale brown, blotted, spotted, and streaked with 
greyish blue and dark brown, assimilating closely in appearance 
