

THE GOLDEN I'LOVEK.' 



The young birds, when hatched, are covered with a bcautilul jiarti- coloured down of 

 bright king's yellow and brown. They quit the nest as soon as hatched, and follow their 

 parents till able to fly and support themselves, which is in the course of a mouth or five 

 weeks. The old birds display great anxiety in protecting their young brood, using 

 various stratagems to divert the attention of an enemy ; among others, that of tumbling 

 over as if imable to fly, or feigning lameness, is the most frequent, and appears indeed to 

 be the instinctive resort of those birds that (ionstruct their nests and I'ear their young on 

 the ground. When aware of the approach of an intruder, the female invariably runs to 

 some distance from her nest before she takes wing, a manoeuvre tending to conceal its 

 true situation ; and the discovery of it is rendered still more difficult by the colour and 

 markings of the eggs, assimilating so closely to that of the ground and surrounding 

 herbage. The usual call of the plover is a plaintive nionotonous whistle, by imitating 

 which it may frequently be enticed within a very short distance. In the breeding 

 season a more varied call is used, during which it flics at a groat elevation, and continues 

 soaring round for a considerable time. To the whistling of the plover our poet Thomson 

 elegantly alludes in his opening lines on Spring, while yet " the trembling year is 

 unconfirmed," so that " scarce the bittern knows his time " to shake iho marsh, 



'• Or from the sliori'. 

 The plovers when to scatter o'er the huiitli. 

 And sing their wild notes to the listening waste." 



Cbaradrins Plnvinlis. — Peiin. 



