avoid detection
by hiding rather than by flying. The flight is rapid and accompanied
by a startling whirr, caused by the quick strokes of their small,
concave, stiff-feathered wings. They roost on the ground, tail to
tail, with heads pointing outward; "a bunch of closely huddled
forms--a living bomb whose explosion is scarcely less startling than
that of dynamite manufacture."

The Partridge is on all hands admitted to be wholly harmless, and at
times beneficial to the agriculturist. It is an undoubted fact that it
thrives with the highest system of cultivation, and the lands that are
the most carefully tilled, and bear the greatest quantity of grain and
green crops, generally produce the greatest number of Partridges.

SUMMARY.

Page 43.

#AMERICAN OSPREY.#--_Pandion paliaetus carolinensis._

RANGE--North America; breeds from Florida to Labrador; winters from
South Carolina to northern South America.

NEST--Generally in a tree, thirty to fifty feet from the ground,
rarely on the ground.

EGGS--Two to four; generally buffy white, heavily marked with
chocolate.

* * * * *

Page 48.

#SORA RAIL.#--_Porzana carolina._

RANGE--Temperate North America, south to the West Indies and northern
South America.

NEST--Of grass and reeds, placed on the ground in a tussock of grass,
where there is a growth of briers.

EGGS--From seven to fourteen; of a ground color, of dark cream or
drab, with reddish brown spots.

* * * * *

Page 51.

#KENTUCKY WARBLER.#--_Geothlypis formosa._

RANGE--Eastern United States; breeds from the Gulf States to Iowa and
Connecticut; winters in Central America.

NEST--Bulky, of twigs and rootlets, firmly wrapped with leaves, on or
near the ground.

EGGS--Four or five; white or grayish white, speckled or blotched with
rufous.

* * * * *

Page 55.

#RED-BREASTED MERGANSER.#--_Merganser Serrator._

RANGE--Northern parts of the Northern Hemisphere; in America breeds
from northern Illinois and New Brunswick northward to the arctic
regions; winters southward to Cuba.

NEST--Of leaves, grasses, mosses, etc., lined with down, on the ground
near water, among rocks or scrubby bushes.

EGGS--Six to twelve; creamy buff.

* * * * *

Page 60.

#YELLOW LEGS.#--_Totanus flavipes._

RANGE--North America, breeding chiefly in the interior from Minnesota