1G1 



TEINGIN/E. 



SANDPIPERS AND ALLIED SPECIES. 



Who that has often visited the shores of the ocean. 

 wandered along the extended sand-beaches on the margin of 

 which the waves terminate their career in foam and uproar, 

 or visited the muddy estuaries alternately filled and emptied 

 by the periodical floods, has not stood to gaze upon the flocks 

 of tiny birds that were busily picking up their food from the 

 moist ground, or wheeling, as if in sport, their devious flight, 

 now skimming the surface of the water, now rising high 

 above the breakers, and then shooting far off to sea, to visit 

 a distant part of the coast. How often, in visiting a sedgy 

 pool surrounded with marshes, have we been saluted, but in 

 no friendly wise, by the shrill clamour of the long-billed and 

 sharp-winged birds which had placed their nests on tufts too 

 remote to be reached. Again, on the long range of heathery 

 hills that we had traversed for many a weary mile, we have 

 come, very unexpectedly to us, and with no welcome from 

 its occupant, upon the nest of the lonely Curlew, which 

 fluttered from among our feet in silence and terror, until 

 reaching a safe distance, she began to entice us away from 

 her treasure, by displaying a broken wing and shattered leg 

 — taught, in fact, by instinct, to act a palpable untruth. 

 Many pleasant sights have we seen on these solitary rambles — 

 here the four spotted eggs of the Dunlin, so like in colour to 

 the surrounding ground, that you wonder how the eye has 

 distinguished them — here the timid young of the same bird 

 squatted among the short heath — there a flock of Godwits 

 thrusting their long bills into the mud ; and, again, the 

 gliding and low flight of the beautiful White-breasted Tatler, 



M 



