DOTTEREL PLOVER. 109 



eggs recently laid, and a young bird, a few days old, were 

 found on the same day, at no great distance from each other. 

 The males assist the females in the incubation of their egas. 

 How long incubation continues I have not yet been able to 

 ascertain, but I am inclined to think that it rarely lasts much 

 longer than eighteen or twenty days. A week or two previous 

 to their departure, they congregate in flocks, and continue 

 together until they finally leave this country, which takes 

 place sometimes during the latter end of August, at others, 

 not before the beginning of September. A few birds, no 

 doubt, are occasionally seen after this period, but they are 

 either late broods, or birds that are returning from more 

 northern latitudes. This autumn I visited several breeding 

 stations on the 25th of August, and again on the 2nd of 

 September, but in neither instance could I observe a single 

 individual. 



" Anxious as I have been for several years past to procure 

 the eggs of the Dottrel, for the purpose of adding undoubted 

 specimens of so rare an egg to my cabinet, as well as to 

 prove beyond all doubt that this bird breeds in Cumberland, 

 yet it was not until the present year that I had the gratifi- 

 cation of accomplishing an object which I have had so long 

 in view. After repeated excursions through the lake dis- 

 trict, this summer, for the express purpose, I was so fortu- 

 nate as to obtain their eggs in two different localities, 

 namely, three on Whiteside, contiguous to Helvellyn, on the 

 29th of June ; and two on the 5th of July, on Robinson, in 

 the vicinity of Buttermere. The former had been incubated 

 twelve or fourteen days, the latter were only recently laid, 

 and in both instances the birds were seen to leave their eggs ; 

 one, on quitting them, immediately spread out its wings and 

 tail, which it trailed on the ground a short distance, and 

 then went away without uttering a single note. On this 

 day (5th July, 1835), a young bird, a few days old, was also 

 captured. 



" Having spent a considerable portion of several days on 

 Robinson, in company with a very able assistant, searching 

 for the eggs of the Dottrel, I had, of course, ample oppor- 

 tunities of observing their manners ; and I flatter myself 



