1870.] REEKS — ON BIRDS OF NEWFOUNDLAND 293 



tial dress, and the American authors have done well in restorins 

 to it the Linnean name of fulicarius, because it is yet a matter 

 of doubt whether the Trinsra Lobata of Linnoeus in Svstemre 

 Naturae ever applied, or was intended to apply, to this species. 

 It is the only species of phalarope I got in Newfoundland, and 

 was called by the settlers the *' gale bird." It is wonderful to 

 watch these pretty and delicate-looking little birds swimming and 

 taking their tiny food from the crests of waves that would 

 " swamp " any boat and many schooners. They are very tame, 

 and swim almost within arm's length of the rocks, giving one the 

 idea that the next immense wave which is fast approaching will 

 cast them on shore, or smash them against the rocks : at such 

 times it takes a quick shot to kill them on the water. 



SCOLOPACID^. 



European Woodcock, Scolopax rusticola, Linn. — A single 

 specimen is said to have been killed in the neighbourhood of St. 

 Johns, in elanuary, 1862 (See "' Ibis," 1862, pp.284, 285). If 

 no deception has been practised here, it is certainly a very extra- 

 ordinary capture, as is also that of another specimen since taken 

 near New York. To those who have spent any length of time on 

 the coast of North America, the problem of the occurrence of so 

 many American birds in Europe is soon solved: it is undoubtedly 

 caused by the prevalence, especially in the fall, of great gales of 

 westerly winds, which probably take most of our American strag- 

 glers off the east coast of Newfoundland ; but how to account for 

 the appearance of two stray specimens of S. rusticola being killed 

 in America — far apart, but in each case near a populous city, and 

 by those so well up in ornithological literature as to be aware of 

 the value of such captures^ presents a difficulty by no means so 

 easily disposed of Of course it is probable that land birds may 

 occasionally get blown off our west coasts by rough easterly winds, 

 but it is equally probable that before they had gone one-third 

 across the Atlantic they would take the wind dead ahead, which 

 would cause them to 'bout ship and be thankful for a fair breeze 

 home. It docs not require a great stretch of the imagination to 

 account for the appearance of an Icelandic species in Greenland, 

 or the northern parts of the American continent, or even in New- 

 foundland, but if I remember right the European woodcock is not 

 found in Iceland. 



American Woodcock, Philohela minor {Gmelin). — Probably 



