BARTRAM’S SANDPIPER 203 
the Upland Plover. The people of that country have 
been paying it a good deal of attention of late; they 
have discovered that it is a charming bird, and at 
the same time that during the last three or four 
decades their gunners have almost extirpated it. 
They fear that it is going the way of the Passenger 
Pigeon, the Pinnated Grouse, the Carolina Parro- 
keet, the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, and, I believe 
we must now add, the Esquimo Whimbrel. 
This species differs from its fellow-migrants of 
the same family from the north to Argentina in its 
wide and even distribution over all that portion of 
the pampas where the native coarse grasses which 
once covered the country have disappeared, an area 
comprising not less than 50,000 square miles. It 
begins to arrive as early as September, coming singly 
or in small parties of three or four; and, extra- 
ordinary as the fact may seem when we consider the 
long distance the bird travels, and the monotonous 
nature of the level country it uses as a “ feeding 
area,” it is probable that every bird returns to the 
same spot year after year; for in no other way could 
such a distribution be maintained, and the birds 
appear every summer evenly sprinkled over so 
immense a surface. 
On the pampas the bird is called Chorlo solo, 
on account of its solitary habit, but more com- 
monly Batitu, an abbreviation of the Indian name 
Mbatuitui. In disposition it is shy, and prefers 
concealment to flight when approached, running 
rapidly away through the long grass or thistles, or 
