and Colour-c/ianc/e in Birds. 181 



one with fulvous tip). These, he claims, represent the 

 successive stages through which each feather passes as the 

 grey winter plumage changes to tiie rufous summer dress, 



A series of these birds is now before me from various 

 parts of the Atlantic coast of America and Greenland. 

 Winter specimens (26171, Cape May, New Jersey, Nov. 28, 

 1878, for example) have the feathers of the back like 

 Mr. Millais' fig. 1 (March), while some individuals also 

 show feathers like his fig. 2. In my March, April, and 

 May birds, in which the change is taking place, I find 

 feathers like his figs. 3 and 4 occurring in numbers, both 

 styles in the same specimen, and of those which are just 

 breaking from the sheath quiie as many have brown tips as 

 white, while all these partly expanded, feathers are black- 

 centred. This certainly shows that these grey feathers are 

 not the early stages of the black, as Mr. Millais would have 

 us believe. Furthermore, in a breeding-bird from Greenland 

 (No. 30197, June 14, 1892) many of the feathers have 

 white tips, although all are more or less abraded. This is 

 additional proof that the white-tipped feathers are always 

 white-tipped (except where they are worn) and not early 

 stages of the rufous-tipped. 



1 may further state that every Sanderling examined which 

 had been taken in the changing spring-plumage showed abun- 

 dant partly-expanded pin-feathers, and yet Mr. Millais states 

 that no moult occurs at this time ! Is it possible that he 

 did not take the trouble to raise the plumage to look for 

 these new feathers, or did he write this statement when he 

 had not his material before him ? 



The above facts set forth by me (and more fully elaborated 

 by Messrs. Chapman and Dwight) show conclusively that the 

 dark nuptial feathers ivhich positively do come in by moult in 

 March, April, and May, remain ])recisely as they are from 

 the time they burst from the sheath until they fall out 

 in the post-nuptial moult. 



To argue that the presence of a series of feathers on one 

 bird, or several which show a range of colour-variation, is a 

 proof that each individual feather goes successively through 



