286 BBITISH BIRDS 



pairing season the male emits a different sound, by way of love-song, 

 as he rises and flutters in the air above his mate, and reiterates a 

 double note so rapidly that it runs into a trill. 



After the breeding season the birds imite in flocks, and leave the 

 moors for the lowlands and seashore. 



The Eastern, or lesser golden plover {Charadrius fulvus), a form 

 of the British golden plover differing only in its slightly smaller 

 size, has been obtained on two or three occasions in this country. 



Grey Plover. 

 Squatarola helvetica. 



Fore-crown white, and upper parts mottled blackish brown and 

 white ; lores, cheeks, throat and neck, and under parts, black 

 Length, twelve inches. After the autumn moult the upper part? 

 are more greyish, and all the rest white. 



This species so closely resembles the golden plover in size and 

 appearance, both in summer and winter, changing, like it, from black 

 to white, and from white to black, that it seems strange to find it 

 classed in a separate genus. But there is a slight anatomical 

 difference in the two birds : the grey plover is provided with a rudi- 

 mentary hind toe, while the golden plover has only three toes on 

 its foot. The present species does not breed in the British Islands. 

 Its summer home is in arctic Siberia. From August, when it begins 

 to arrive, until the following spring it is found on our coasts every 

 year in small flocks. It is much less common than the golden 

 plover, and while with us is almost exclusively a bird of the sea- 

 shore. 



The grey plover is considered a poor bird for the table ; but in 

 Yarrell's work it is stated that Enghshmen have not always been of 

 that opinion, that it was formerly esteemed above most birds, and 

 that the saying, * a grey plover cannot please him,' was used of a 

 person with an excessively fastidious palate. The bird proverbial 

 for its delicacy was probably our golden plover, which to this day 

 is caUed grey ploTsr in Ireland. 



