6 SCOLOPACID^. 



before the harassed bachelor. He turns his breast first to one side, then to the 

 other, as though to escape, but there is his gentle wooer ever pressing her suit 

 before him. Frequently he takes flight to another part of the pool, all to no 

 purpose. If with affected indiff'erence he tries to feed, she swims along side by 

 side, almost touching him, and at intervals rises on wing above him and, poised a 

 foot or two over his back, makes a half dozen quick, sharp wing-strokes, 

 producing a series of sharp, whistling noises in rapid succession. In the course 

 of time it is said that water will wear the hardest rock, and it is certain that time 

 and importunity have their full eff"ect upon the male of this Phalarope, and soon 

 all are comfortably married, while mater familias no longer needs to use her 

 seductive ways and charming blandishments to draw his notice. 



" About the first of June the dry, rounded side of a little knoll, near some 

 small pool, has four dark, heavily-marked eggs laid in a slight hollow, upon 

 whatever lining the spot afi'ords, or, more rarely, upon a few dry straws and 

 grass-blades brought and loosely laid together by the birds. Here the captive 

 male is introduced to new duties, and spends half his time on the eggs, while the 

 female keeps about the pool close by. In due time the young are hatched and 

 come forth, beautiful little balls of bufi" and brown. 



" During incubation, if the nest is approached, the parent usually flies off the 

 eggs when the intruder is some yards away, and proceeds to feed about the 

 surface or edge of the nearest pool, as though nothing unusual had occurred. At 

 times the parent shows a little anxiety, and swims restlessly about the pool, 

 uttering a low, sharp, metallic ' pleep, pleep.' When a bird leaves the eggs it is 

 usually joined at once by its mate. In one or two instances the parent bird came 

 gliding stealthily through the grass to the nest while I was occupied in packing the 

 eggs in my basket. Fresh eggs are rarely found after June 20, and by the middle 

 to 20th of July the young are fledged and on the wing. By the 12th to 15th of 

 July a few of the ashy feathers of the autumnal plumage appear, and soon after 

 old and young begin to gather in parties of from five to a hundred or more, and 

 seek the edges of large ponds and flats or the muddy parts of the coast and 

 borders of tide creeks. During August and September they are found on the 

 bays, and the last are seen about the last of September or first of October. 



" Murdoch found it a rare summer visitant at Point Barrow, where it was 

 noticed only once. They breed on all the islands of Bering Sea, the north coast 

 of Siberia, and we saw them common about Herald and Wrangel Islands in July 

 and August 1881. It is plentiful throughout the interior of Northern Alaska, as 

 well as on the salt marshes of the coast. Dall saw it all along the Yukon, and 

 found a nest with two eggs at Pastolik, near the Yukon mouth. 



