SKETCHES OP EUROPEAN ORNITHOLOGY. 251 



Taube, G., in Lear's best style ; both are unexceptionable, and may 

 truly be called living portraits. Dispersed all over Europe. We 

 need not detail its habits. Mr. Gould informs us that a pair of 

 these birds once built a nest and laid two eggs in confinement ; and 

 we have no doubt it would frequently do so if properly managed, 

 despite the agreement to which most ornithologists have come, that 

 it never has and never will breed in domesticity. Those who have 

 not had the pleasure of feasting their eyes on this plate, scarcely 

 know what a good ornithological drawing is. 



The eighth part concludes with two lovely figures of the Spotted 

 Sandpiper, Totanus macularius — Chevalier perle, Fr. — Gefleckte 

 Strandlaiifer, G. — and as we have said so much ourselves, we shall 

 now permit the author to have his say. Here then follows a part 

 of his account of the bird : — '* This elegant little Sandpiper is most 

 intimately allied to the well-known Common Sandpiper (Tolanus 

 ht/poleucosj, which pays its annual visit during the summer months 

 to the brooks and rivulets of our island ; but, unlike this latter bird, 

 its visits are of the most rare occurrence, no instance having come 

 under our own observation. M. Temminck states that it occurs ac- 

 cidentally on the shores of the Baltic and in some of the provinces 

 of Germany, but never in Holland. The native country of this 

 bird appears to be the arctic regions of both continents ; but it is 

 most abundant in America, extending from these high latitudes over 

 the whole of the United States, where it appears to take up the 

 same situation as the Totanus hypoleucos, frequenting Pennsylvania, 

 and the rivers Schuylkill and Delaware, as we are informed by 

 Wilson, from whose valuable work we have taken the liberty of 

 extracting an account of the habits and manners of this bird, which 

 we have not had the opportunity of observing." The rest of the 

 description is, accordingly, from Wilson, which it will not be neces- 

 sary to quote. We shall have much pleasure in resuming our cri- 

 tical notices of the valuable and ably-executed Birds qf Europe in 

 our next. 



