BIRDS HUNTED FOR FOOD OR SPORT. 255 



Land or any of the islands in the northern ocean it has escaped 

 his notice. He gives but one record for Prince Edward Island 

 and but one for Nova Scotia. Mr. E. T. Carbonnell and Prof. 

 S. N. Earle write that although this bird is not seen now on 

 Prince Edward Island, it "used to be plentiful" there; and 

 Mr. Harold F. Tufts writes from Wolfville, N. S., that it has 

 decreased there fifty per cent, in fifteen years, indicating that 

 some still remain. The early arrival of this species on our 

 coast gives color to the belief that it nests in the Labrador 

 Peninsula. In this it agrees closely with the Least and Semi- 

 palmated Sandpipers, both of which have been found breeding 

 in Labrador. Alexander Wilson, the father of American orni- 

 thology, believed that this bird bred not far north of the 

 United States, judging by the lateness of the season when it 

 leaves in the spring, the development of the eggs in the ovaries 

 of the females at that time and the early arrival of the birds 

 on their return. 



Individual Dowitchers are seen returning southward in 

 migration early in July all along the coast, from Massachusetts 

 to South Carolina. The bird crosses the Provinces of Ontario 

 and Quebec in a direct line from its summer home to New 

 England. Formerly it was plentiful along the Atlantic coast, 

 and is still not uncommon in New Jersey, common in Virginia 

 and abundant on the coast of South Carolina. Some indi- 

 viduals apparently reach South America by way of Florida 

 and the Antilles, though many winter on the south Atlantic 

 and Gulf coasts. It is not impossible that individuals of 

 this species which winter in South America take the long 

 flight from Nova Scotia to the West Indies; of this, however, 

 I have seen no reliable evidence, and am inclined to believe 

 that this bird habitually migrates up and down the Atlantic 

 seaboard. It does not come up the Mississippi valley in the 

 spring. A part of the flight seems, however, to leave the coast 

 of the Carolinas in the fall and fly direct to the Lesser Antilles. 

 There seem to be good reasons to believe that the majority 

 of this species migrate directly south and perhaps a little east 

 of south until they reach the coast, and if, as seems probable, 

 they breed along the eastern coast of Hudson Bay and in the 



