THE PIED YSTER-CATCHEK. lOo 



able attention, and found the most perfect 8pecin:«ins as 

 follows : — 



Length, six inches and three quarters; extent, thirteen 

 inches and a half; bill, black, nostrils, united in a tubular 

 projection, the upper mandible grooved from thence, and 

 overhanging the lower like that of a bird of prey ; head, 

 back, and lower parts, brown sooty black; greater wing- 

 coverts, pale brown, miautely tipped with white ; sides of 

 the vent, and whole tail-coverts, pure white; wings and 

 tail, deep black, the latter nearly even at the tip, or very 

 glightly forked; in some specimens, two or three of the 

 exterior tail-feathers were white for an inch or so at the 

 root ; legs and naked part of the thighs, black ; feet, web- 

 bed, with the slight rudiments of a hind toe ; the membrane 

 of the food is marked with a spot of straw yellow, and finely 

 serrated along the edges; eyes, black. Male and female 

 diflfering nothing in colour. 



THE PIEB OYSTER-CATCHER. {Exmatopw 



ostralegus.') 



This smgular species (says Wilson) although nowhere 



aumerous, inhabits almost every sea-shore, both on the new 



and old continent, but is never found inland. It is the 



•bIj one of its genuii hitherto discovered, and from the odd- 



7 



