173 WADING BIRDS. 



The female, larger, and of somewhat duller colors. The young 

 scarcely differing from the adult in winter plumage. They moult 

 twice in the year, changing greatly the colors of their plumage, 

 and the female acquires her dress later than the male. 



The Godwits are large birds allied to the Curlews, with very long 

 bills and legs, dwelling principally in marshes, and frequenting the 

 estuaries, and muddy banks of rivers, at no great distance, from 

 the sea. Their sight is weak, and their habits principally noc- 

 turnal, feeding usually on insects, larvse and worms, which they 

 collect at twilight, or by the light of the moon ; for this purpose 

 they thrust their long and sensitive bills, like Snipes, into mud and 

 w^et sand, as the feebleness of this organ renders it unfit for foraging 

 in the earth, or in gravel. Indolent, timid, and shy, they live in 

 flocks, scattered over the deep morasses, where they resort, hiding 

 sedulously by day among the rank grass and reeds, which they only 

 leave night and morning in quest of food ; at such times their hoarse 

 and shrill barking voice, is heard from the depths of the marsh, and 

 has, from its quailing discordance, been compared to the cry of a goat. 

 "When discovered, they run out rapidly, without taking wing, among 

 the reeds and swampy grounds in which they are always entrenched. 

 They breed in society in the same situations, they usually fre- 

 quent, laying their eggs among the grass or in the shelter of ad- 

 joining bushes. The Godwits, like some of our Sandpipers, (par- 

 ticularly Tringa WUsonii.) migrate in flocks, by night, particularly 

 when it is moonlight, and may, at such times, be heard, and some- 

 times seen passing along high in the air. The species of the genus 

 are few, but spread over all the cold and temperate parts of the north- 

 ern hemisphere. Of these, in all about four, two are confined to 

 Europe, and tw^o others to North America. 



