BAR-TAILED GODWIT. 497 



insects, worms, small crustaceans, and mollusks. Its note 

 is described by Mr. Harting as sounding like loii-ey, lou-ey, 

 and by this the birds in their winter dress may be dis- 

 tinguished at a distance from the Whimbrel, which they 

 otherwise resemble (B. Middlesex, p. 184). It is fond of the 

 company of other waders, and may easily be attracted by 

 an imitation of their notes. Owing to their long bills, 

 Godwits are not unfrequently called " sea-woodcocks," and 

 Mr. Stevenson states, on the authority of Mr. Dowell, 

 that by the local Norfolk gunners the smaller males, more 

 abundant in the spring flocks, are called " picks," whilst 

 the females, and those found singly in autumn, are called 

 " scamells." It will be remembered that the drunken 

 Caliban offers to Stephano, among other dainties, " young 

 scamels from the rocks." (Tempest, Act ii. Sc. 2.)* 



In the winter plumage the beak is black at the point, the 

 basal portion pale reddish-brown ; irides dusky-brown ; top 

 of the head and back of the neck ash-brown, each feather 

 with a central streak of darker brown along the line of the 

 shaft ; back and scapulars dark brown, edged with pale 

 wood-brown ; all the wing-coverts, secondaries, and tertials, 

 dark brown, with greyish- white edges ; primary quill-feathers 

 dusky-black, with white shafts, the shorter ones edged with 

 white ; rump and upper tail-coverts white, barred with 

 brown ; tail-feathers barred throughout their whole length 

 with dark brown, and greyish- white in nearly equal breadth ; 

 neck in front ash-brown ; breast, belly, and vent, white ; 

 under tail-coverts white, with only one or two transverse bars 

 of brown towards the end ; legs and toes dark blue, the claws 

 black. 



A female, which, as in the Black-tailed Godwit, is larger 

 than the male, measured sixteen inches ; the length of the 

 beak three inches and three-quarters ; from the carpal joint 

 to the end of the first quill-feather, which is the longest, 

 eight inches and a half. The legs of this species are much 



* Mr. Harting, who is an authority on the Ornithology of Shakespeare, con- 

 siders that the poet wrote "sea-mells" or " sea-malls, "•*,«. , Sea-gulls, which 

 at that time were esteemed for the table. 



VOL. III. ., 3 s 



