124 WADING BIRDS. 



man, these little timorous rovers are ready to give the alarm. 

 At first a slender peep is heard, which is then followed by 

 two or three others, and presently peet 'pip 'pip 'p'p mur- 

 murs in a lisping whistle through the quailing ranks, as they 

 rise swarming on the wing, and inevitably entice with them 

 their larger but less watchful associates. Towards evening, 

 in fine weather, the marshes almost reecho with the shrill, 

 but rather murmuring or lisping, subdued, and querulous call 

 of peet, and then a repetition of pe-dee, pe-dee, dee dee, which 

 seems to be the collecting cry of the old birds calling to- 

 gether their brood, for, when assembled, the note changes 

 into a confused murmur of peet, peet, attended by a short 

 and suppressed whistle. 



At most times, except in the spring, they are fat, and well 

 flavored, though less esteemed than many of the other species, 

 from their smallness, and an occasional sedgy taste, which 

 deteriorates them. From the oily and deliquescent nature 

 of the fat, which loads the cellular membrane in this hyper- 

 boreal natal family of birds, we may, perhaps, perceive a con- 

 stitutional reason, why most of them thrive better, and have 

 sucn a predilection for those cool and temperate climates, 

 in which they renew their exhausted vigor, and acquire 

 the requisite strength and energy necessary for the period 

 of reproduction. It is indeed certain, that those stragglers, 

 which, from age or disability, remain, as it were, hermits, 

 secluded from the rest of the wandering host, do neither 

 propagate, nor fatten, while thus detained through summer in 

 the warmer climates. Of this we have already mentioned 

 instances, in the case of straggling Curlews, killed in this 

 vicinity by the 18th of July, a period when the main mass 

 of the species are engaged in feeding, or just hatching their 

 tender young. 



This little Sandpiper, which we have named in honor of 

 Wilson, (certainly not being the species first intended as 



