LIMICOL^. ( 225 ) CHARADRIIDM. 



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THE LAPWING. 



PEWIT, PEESEWEEP, TUCHIT, GKEEN PLOVER. 



Vanellus vulgaris. 



And here the lonely Lapwing whoops along, 

 That piercing shrieks her still-repeated song, 

 Flaps her blue wing, displays her pointed axst. 

 And, cowering, lures the peasant from her nest. 

 But if where all her dappled treasure lies 

 He bend his steps, no more she round him flies ; 

 Forlorn, despairing of a tnother's skill. 

 Silent, and sad, she seeks the distant hill. 



Leyden, Scenes of Infa?icy. 



DuPJNG the spring, summer, and autumn months the Peese- 

 weep is numerous all over the county ; but on the approach 

 of severe weather in winter it migrates southwards to milder 



1 So named from its well-known cry. Mr. Hardy likens the call of the Peese- 

 weep to " Pear- weep," the r being burred, more or less distinctly. 



2 Teuchit — the Lapwing, probably so named from its crest: French "toquet," 

 the cap of a child. It is termed " tuquheit " by Birrell in his " Passage of the Pil- 

 grimer." Watson's Collection of Poems, part ii. p. 27. 



The Tuquheit and the Sterhng than 

 Togidder with the Pelican 



Flew in ane randell richt ; 

 The Piot and the Papiugo 

 With Goldspink, I sa thame go, 



Syne laich thay down did licht. 



Letden's Complaynt of Scotland. 



The word "tuquheit" occurs in Holland's Houlat, ^vritten about 1445. The 

 cry of the bird is said in the Complaynt of Scotland io he. " theuis-nek : " "The 

 teuchitis cryit theuis-nek, when the piettis clatterit." 



Dr. Henderson of Chirnside gives in his MS. the following verse of an old song 

 which relates to localities in the neighbourhood of Chirnside : — 



O meet me by the Tuchit yetts, 



Or by the Kaeter Well, 

 And we will sit amang the gowans 



Not bonnier than thysel. 



VOL. IL P 



