8o 



PLOVER GROUP 



vulnerable even when the valves are tightly closed. Mussels present- 

 ing this aspect of the shell are carefully sought out by the birds. 

 Finalh', about thirteen per cent of the mussels are attacked at the 

 posterior end of the shell. 



g^jj^. The stilt, or black-winged stilt, as it is often called, 



(HimantoDus '^ *^^ Charadriiis Jiiniantopus of Linnaeus, and hence 



candidus) ''^ many modern ornithological works is designated 



Hiviantopus hiviantopus, in preference to the title by 



which it has been so long and so generally known. Were it but of 



larger size and furnished with a neck in proportion to its enormously 



elongated legs, it might well 

 have been called the giraffe 

 among birds ; but the stilt, 

 as a matter of fact, has no 

 need of an unduly long neck, 

 its habit being to wade in 

 shallow water up to its knees, 

 when the beetles and other 

 water-insects, which form its 

 food, are brought within easy 

 reach of its long beak. From 

 the sea -pie, with which it 

 agrees in the absence of the 

 hind-toe, the stilt may be 

 distinguished at a glance by 

 the great length of the leg 

 from which it takes its name, 

 and the narrow slender beak, 

 much inferior in length to the 

 5,,.,,., lower segment of the leg. 



Other characteristics are to 

 be found in the long and pointed form of the wings, in which the first 

 primary quill is the longest, the short and evenly truncated tail, and the 

 partial webbing of the toes, the web between the outer and middle toes 

 being longer than the one connecting the other two. The bird is one of 

 some half-dozen others forming a genus of which the collective distribu- 

 tion includes the temperate and tropical regions of the whole globe. 

 Unlike so many of the plover tribe, it does not travel north to breed, 

 Denmark, indeed, apparently marking its ordinary northern limits ; but 

 nests throughout the Mediterranean countries, many parts of India, and 



