256 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



Genus ANCYLOCHILUS, Kaup. 



The single species of this genus inhabits Europe, America, 

 India, and Australia. 



Sp. 523. ANCYLOCHILUS SUBAEQUATUS. 

 Curlew Sandpiper. 



Scolopax subarquata, Gmel. Syst. Nat., vol. i. p. 658. 



Tringa subarquata, Teram. Man. d'Orn., torn. ii. p. 609. 



Pelidna subarquata, Steph. Cont. of Shaw's Gen. Zool., vol. xii. p. 96. 



Schoeniclus subarquatus, G. R. Gray, List of Birds in Brit. Mus. Coll., 



part iii. p. 105. 

 Ancylocheilus subarquatus, Bonap. Compt. Rend, de I'Acad. Sci., torn. 



xliii. seance du 2 Aout, 1856. 

 Pygmy Curlew of British Ornithologists. 



Schoeniclus suharquatus, Gould, Birds of Australia, fol., vol. vi. 

 pi. 32. 



Some species of Australian birds are precisely identical with 

 those of India and Em'ope, and the present may be quoted as 

 a case in point, for I find no difference between this bird and 

 the Pygmy Curlew of England, except that Australian spe- 

 cimens are a little larger than those of Europe ; its distribution 

 over the shores of AustraUa appears to be universal, but at 

 the same time it is very thinly dispersed ; and there seem to 

 be no localities in which it can be looked for and found with 

 certainty at any stated time. Like the rest of the Sandpipers, 

 it resorts to the shingly beach of the sea-shore and the banks 

 of estuaries and rivers. The change from the grey to the red 

 livery, which renders the birds so conspicuous in the summer 

 season, takes place in Australia at precisely the opposite 

 time of the year to that in which it occurs in Europe. 



Of the three specimens in my collection, one was killed on 

 Rottnest Island, another on the main-land of Western Au- 

 stralia, and the third at Port Macquarrie in NeW South Wales. 



