74 THE BIRDS OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



species on the great mud-flats near the mouth of the 

 Guadalquivir ; many waders of other species were 

 there in thousands, e.g. Dunlins, Curlew Sandpipers, 

 Avocets, Stilt Plovers, and Pratincoles, besides many 

 Whimbrels, Greenshanks, and other species ; but in 

 the course of my bird-seeking existence I never met 

 with any feathered fowl in such numbers as these 

 Knots in any part of the world that I have visited. 

 I have seen vast clouds of Starlings circling over, 

 and plunging down into, their favourite roosting- 

 places in various localities, I have witnessed mar- 

 vellous congregations of Sparrows at sunset in the 

 orange-groves of Sicily, and I have seen the sky dark 

 with wild-fowl in south-eastern Europe, but all these 

 were literally as nothing compared with the present 

 species in the Andalucian Marisma at the season 

 above mentioned. 



Posted on a point of the drier land that here and 

 there ran out into the marsh, we sent two or three of 

 our companions on horseback to make a circuit of 

 two or three miles on the open, and put the birds to 

 us, and truly the result was wonderful ; the Curlews 

 and Greenshanks rose first, as soon as the horses' 

 heads were turned towards us, and fled, shrieking 

 wildly, to all points of the compass, but as our 

 drivers approached the earth seemed to rise before 

 them, and a continuous stream of Knots kept coming 

 towards us, thousands often alighting within a few 

 yards, the brilliant summer tints of their plumage 

 varied by the companionship of Grey Plovers, Turn- 

 stones, Avocets, and many other species. 



On the first day we contented ourselves with 

 shooting about a dozen Knots as specimens, and 

 after that day put in a right and left for the pot 



